Iowa

The state

Get to know Iowa

Iowa is in the U.S. Midwest, between the Mississippi River to the east and the Missouri to the west. It is a sea of corn and soybeans, of gentle rolling hills and red barns, with small towns founded by German, Dutch and Scandinavian immigrants. For the traveler, the state is a portrait of rural America.

Des Moines, the capital, has a gold-domed capitol, a downtown sculpture park and the Iowa State Fair, which draws more than 1 million visitors over 11 days in August, with livestock exhibitions, food on a stick and a butter cow sculpture—a tradition since 1911.

About 45 minutes to the southwest, Winterset and Madison County hold the 19th-century wooden covered bridges that appear in the film The Bridges of Madison County. To the east, near Dyersville, the baseball field built in the middle of a cornfield for the movie Field of Dreams is open to visitors. Near Cedar Rapids, the Amana Colonies are seven villages founded by German immigrants, offering crafts and traditional food.

In the northeast, the Mississippi River runs between limestone bluffs: Effigy Mounds National Monument protects earthen mounds shaped like bears and birds built by indigenous peoples, and Dubuque has a cable car and a river museum. In the west, the Loess Hills form a band of wind-deposited hills along the Missouri River. On the plate, the maid-rite, a loose-meat sandwich, and summer sweet corn.