I'm not sure if Iowans really call Okoboji "Iowa's Lake Country" but that sure is what it felt like to me!

I moved to Iowa 2 and a half years ago from Minnesota and one of the things my wife and I noticed early in our move was how few lakes there are compared to where we both grew up in Minnesota.

That's not to say there aren't plenty of fun places to enjoy some time on the water in Iowa but it's definitely different. To move from a state that has 11,000+ lakes compared to Iowa's 34 natural lakes was noticeable. On the 4th weekend in August, Okoboji was infiltrated by a bunch of people with the last name Glidden, and we threw in a Nielsen for good measure...AND WE HAD A BLAST!

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My family spent time on West Lake Okoboji, Upper Gar Lake, and East Lake Okoboji. My dog and I checked out a high school football game for a few minutes, we saw the Pork Tornadoes perform and we walked around the Arnold's Park area for a few hours.

On The Water

My uncle Per lives in Windom, Minnesota, only a 45-minute drive north of Okoboji, Iowa and he brought his pontoon to let us enjoy a day exploring the waterways in Okoboji. It was a gorgeous day as we trolled along the water. My dog had never been on a boat before so we were curious how she would handle being a "boat dog" for a day and she seemed to enjoy it just fine.

The weather was great and it made for a very busy day on the water but we still had a great time. We looked at some of the incredible houses on the lakes, saw some of the incredible bars on the water, and parked the boat so Winona (our dog) could splash around in the water. If I'm not mistaken, this was my first day on a boat all summer and I wanted to enjoy every second of it.

Arnolds Park

My wife and I checked something off of her "relationship bucket list" that we had never done in our 8+ years of being together. We road one of the oldest roller coasters in the world and this was our first time being on a roller coaster together!

While we don't have a picture of us on the roller coaster... here we are after riding "The Legend." According to Roadside America, The Legend is one of the oldest roller coasters in the world and debuted in 1927.

We were both pretty surprised at how fast The Legend was for being 97 years old.

We also walked around Arnold's Park while the Pork Tornadoes performed and enjoyed an evening outside, taking in as much of Arnold's Park as we possibly could.

We had so much fun and enjoyed some much-needed family time. We joked, ate, drank, and talked every day away into the evenings. We talked about possibly making this a yearly occurrence so who knows, maybe Okoboji will be infiltrated by a bunch of Glidden's again next year.