Where the river and fun converge

By Judy Baldwin

For Iowa.com

Des Moines county, population 42,351, has a rich relationship with the Mississippi River on its east border.

With over 27,000 residents, Burlington, the county’s largest community, rests high on a bluff overlooking the river. The city sits on Highway 61, part of the Great River Road, a 3,000 mile network of federal, state, and country roads that parallel the Mississippi River on both sides from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico.

At Burlington’s Lock and Dam #18 visitors can watch barges make their way up and down the river.

But not all of Burlington’s fun is on the river. At Fun City, fun is defined by an indoor water park, a 3-D virtual roller coaster, a laser tag arena and a 24-lane bowling alley. Other Fun City attractions include an upscale billiards and gaming lounge, an indoor golfing simulator and an indoor go-kart speedway.

At the 34 Raceway go-kart drivers are replaced by real race car drivers that circle the 3/8 semi-banked track every Saturday night from April through September.

Other drivers test their skills on Burlington’s Snake Alley, named by Ripley’s Believe It or Not as the “Crookedest Street in the World.” Snake Alley has five half-curves and two quarter-curves and drops 58 feet over a distance of 275 feet.

Burlington is home to the Kansas City Class A baseball farm team, the Burlington Bees, who play at Community Field.

Basketball was the game in the county’s second largest community, Mediapolis. Few communities in Iowa have a richer history in girls’ high school basketball than Mediapolis, a town of just over 1,600 people. Between 1960 and 1987 the team had a 97.6 winning percentage under coach Bud McLearn. McLearn took 21 teams into the Iowa Girls State High School Tournament and brought home two state championship titles. In 2001, the Mediapolis high school gymnasium was named McLearn Court, three years after McLearn was inducted into the Iowa Girls’ Coaches Association Hall of Fame.

Cities in Des Moines County