Dubuque 'til I Puke!

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How I Became a Passenger on This Trip

Friday night was a dear, dear friends birthday party so I of course attended multiple bars and shenanigans and had a lot to drink. After the birthday girl retired around 2AM, I met up with another dear, dear friend and went to a couple more bars. During this escapade, she informed me that she was going to her hometown Dubuque, Iowa the next day with a couple more friends of ours. She invited me and I immediately accepted. She anticipated that I would go home and get ready; however, I knew that if I went home, I would not be going on this trip so I spent the night and woke up the next morning with nothing but the clothes on my back.

Saturday

We had gone to bed about 330am the night before and woke up around 8 so I was rather tired. However, I am a trooper when it comes to these things and I managed to pull through. Luckily for me, one of the first stops was Target where I was able to buy some underwear, socks, deodorant, jeans and nice shirts for the weekend.

From there, we went to the mall in Davenport, Iowa. This mall was rather uninspiring and reminded me of a mix between Livonia mall and Laurel Park Place. There were a bunch of legitimate stores that sold utter crap tchotkes. Things like felted canvas art and swords. Shit was weird. My friends bought some jeans from express and we would be on our way.

The drive is actually quite nice. It is along the Mississippi River which is rather large. I enjoyed it.

Once we got to my friend's parents home, we relaxed and had a few snacks. For dinner, we went to the Bricktown Brewery where I had the veggie burger which was delicious. However, I ate way too much. After that, we perused the mall for a little bit and then headed back home where we promptly got ready and went to one of my friends friends house. Luckily for us, we have a friend that can't drink (DD HOLLER). So the drinking began. Soon enough, it was late and we headed to the downtown bar area. Dubuque bars are brosef central which is fine. I had fun and enjoyed the atmosphere. The music was actually pretty good. After that bar closed, we went to East Dubuque in Illinois where the bars are open later. When we got to the bar, it was apparently karaoke night to which my friend responded by hogging the microphone to other peoples songs any chance she got. It was fun and I met a couple boys but couldn't do anything about it as this was not my hometown.

From there, we went to yet another persons house and hung out. We should have gone home. Eventually we left and arrived at my friends parents house at 5AM. Oui!

Balltown, Galena, and home

We woke up around noon and headed to Balltown, IA for the buffet at Breitbach Country Dining. On the way there, we got to see the farm that my friend's father was raised on and heard some great stories of him growing up there. Breitbach used to be really old but then it burnt down, was built again and burnt down again within a year. It was rather charming. This Midwestern town had what they called a "flea market" along the sides of the road. It was more of a community yard sale if you ask me but nonetheless, you could find some nice antiques if you looked. We first went to go look at the overlook which looked upon the Mississippi River. It was very pretty but mostly farmland. I wish the trees were in their prime. While we waited to get a table (for about an hour), I got to try some of their homemade wines. While I was wine tasting an ubber conservative Bush loving, tea partier ran into the pile of pumpkins which prompted one lonely pumpkin to start rolling down the driveway. My friend went and grabbed it to which my other friend announced to the crowd that the pumpkin was saved by a liberal democrat. LOVE my friends.
The food was actually very fantastic. One of my favorites was of course the biscuits and gravy but everything was super delicious. I even tried something new that I never tried before but cannot remember for the life of me what its name is; I think some type of wurst involving pork.

From there we drove back to Dubuque where we quickly packed up, said our goodbyes and headed to Galena. Galena was very nice. We started at the winery and then went to this B&B where my friend was engaged to about 6 months previous. The tour of the B&B was breathtaking. The rooms were absolutely breathtaking and full of great accessories. I really liked it and could definitely see myself running a B&B like this one in my retirement years.

For dinner, we stopped at Culvers. It was good. Then we headed home.

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Photos

Balltown Overlook
This is Iowa for ya.

More Iowa
In Balltown