Dietz Summer Road Trip

Wednesday we woke up and drove a few hours across Iowa and into Illinois to our next stop: Springfield, IL.

We first went to the Lincoln home. There is a visitor center there and the home is free to tour during the day but you have to get tickets. The Lincoln home is right around the corner from the visitor center so we got our tickets and went to wait for our tour.

 This is the only home that Abraham Lincoln has ever owned. There is another home nearby that they rented at first, but this was the one that they had finally bought and he planned to return to after the presidency. The tour started outside with some brief information and then we enter the home through the front door. A lot of the things in the home are original, or exact replications (for example the wall paper was a replication) but the furniture and bed were mainly all original.

The tour starts in the front parlor and then into the dining room and then the family room.

Next we headed upstairs and the railing is original. As our Ranger said, this railing is one that Mr. Lincoln would have used, so as you walk up the stairs and use the railing it is like “shaking the president’s hand”.

At the top of the stairs is Mr. Lincoln’s bedroom and then Mary Todd Lincoln’s bedroom was right around the corner. His bed looked way too small for someone his height but our ranger assured us it was in fact 5 inches longer. There is also the boys room and the maids room upstairs as well.

  
  
  
You then go down the back stairs and it takes you into the kitchen with the original stove.

 After the tour of the house we walked to the Abraham Lincoln Museum. This was a great museum and the exhibit that was probably the best, there was no photography allowed. They had the bed in which he died in while in Washington DC, the gloves he was wearing, a carriage he rode in during his inauguration, and a lot of other original artifacts.

  
  
  
 The rest of the museum then starts with his boyhood and goes through the end of the Civil War and his assassination. There was a full size replica of the log cabin house he grew up in. There were also full size mannequins showing various highlights throughout his life and career.

They also had 2 great videos we really enjoyed. One was the “Campaign of 1860” narrated by Tim Russert and it covered the 1860 election as though it was modern day. And then a “Civil War in 4 minutes” video that showed the battles, movements, and casualties of both sides of the civil war. There were a few actual artifacts, including the last axe that it was believed he used.

After the museum we went into the Library, however it was an actual research library  so there were not really any exhibits there.

The nice thing about Springfield is that all of the Land of Lincoln museum and homes are all right there. We ran out of time so we did not get to see Lincoln tomb, it is at the Oak Ridge Cemetery and was about a 10 minutes drive from downtown Springfield but it closed at 5pm. So we walked to our hotel and checked in. Even our hotel was loaded with Abraham Lincoln pictures and logos.

After a while we walked to Obed an Issac’s. It was the only brewery in Springfield and it was an awesome place. We hung out there for almost 2 hours before dinner. They had a restaurant and bar there, but we sat outside in the “beer garden”. They had an outside bar, which included Adult Slushies, and had corn-hole, a giant connect four game, and a lot of out door seating. Our bartender was also a teacher so we talked to her a lot about teaching and differences between IL and NC.

 We had dinner reservations at Nic & Nino’s. Like the restaurant in Portland, OR we went to, this one was also located on the 30th floor but this was at the top of the Hilton hotel right next to us. We got a window table this time and actually got to see the sun set! Since there are no tall buildings at all in Springfield it was a great view.

 They brought us a serious bread basket and a legit Caesar Salad. For dinner we had a Chicken caprese pasta dish and ribeye. It of coarse was delicious and unfortunately we did not have room for dessert.

  
 We headed back to the hotel, stopped at the hotel bar and then enjoyed watching tv in our room. It was great and relaxing to rest up for one more night in the tent tomorrow!