At two hundred feet, the tallest waterfall in Iowa is two hundred feet taller than I expected it to be.
Summer wanderings took me to Decorah, Iowa today.
I’ve been meaning to explore this place for a while. I stopped here once in late 2023 and again in very early 2025 for meals at Toppling Goliath Brewing across the street from the airport. It’s evident while taking off and landing at Decorah Municipal Airport that Decorah has “relief” to it that you don’t usually see in Iowa. There are hills, bluffs, and even exposed limestone outcroppings here and there. Those features brought me back.
The airport
The first thing I noticed upon landing is that the airport is in the process of sprouting a new hangar and terminal building. It’s only a foundation now but I expect on completion it’ll be a significant improvement over the 1970s-era lounge that greets transients today.
There is at least one courtesy car available at the airport. Possibly two. One is a typical retired police cruiser with “Airport Courtesy Car” emblazoned on it. The other is a small SUV with slightly ambiguous “City of Decorah – Go Home Safe” decals. I’m sure they’re both courtesy cars, I just haven’t confirmed it yet. Nor have I confirmed how one would go about using the cars. I didn’t find keys in any of the normal hiding places.
Edit: I received a response from airport management. The keys to both cars are, as of June 20th, in a lockbox in the pilot lounge. “Please be sure to sign out a vehicle.”
I usually don’t use courtesy cars on my fly-outs because cars kill adventure. They make everything feel mundane, like an errand. But the hills between the airport and Decorah are borderline severe. Pedaling a bike up them is difficult, trusting the brakes down them is foolish. I found that a cautious hybrid bike/walk between the airport and town takes about half an hour.
The town
My ultimate destination today was the waterfall at Dunning’s Spring Park, I’d zeroed in on that in Google Maps, but Decorah lies between the airport and the park, so I was able to spend some time there with no additional effort. I took the Trout Run Trail from the outskirts toward downtown, hopping off for lunch at Water Street Deli. The sandwich and service were top notch, exactly what I like to find on a trip like this, and the main drag in town has a standard but charming small town look and feel. Lots of brick, most of it real.
After lunch I headed toward Dunning’s Spring Park. It’s an easy ten minute hop across the Upper Iowa River on College Drive past one of those bizarro Iowa Kwik Trips.
The park and the waterfall
From the parking lot at Dunning’s Spring Park, it’s a five minute walk up a paved path to the main waterfall. The stream cascades alongside the path for most of its distance. The falling water is crystal clear and loud enough in its descent to drown out the voices of all but the youngest, most rambunctious visitors. It’s a popular spot but it manages to be serene in a babbling, sloshing, splashing sort of way.
The main falls is about fifty feet high. It’s a steep staircase of rock, not a plunge. It’s a different geology than, say, Cascade Falls in Osceola, but it creates a similar atmosphere through the sound, canopy of trees, and wading pool below the falls.
There is a terrain-conforming staircase from the pool below the main falls up to a spot where the stream emerges from a fissure in the limestone. The steps end in a deck with a top-down view of the water flowing out of the rock, around the corner, and over the falls.
After spending about half an hour around the falls, I hiked about three miles out and back on the ice cave trail. I did not see any ice caves because I never ventured onto any of the siding trails. I was in street shoes, parts of the trail were moderately steep, and I knew I had a long bike/walk back to the airport ahead of me.
It was best if I didn’t work my legs too hard up there. I’m old.
When I got back to the parking lot, there were a few tubers lined up to float under the stream’s final short plunge into the Upper Iowa River. It looked refreshing if chilly–that water is quite cold.
I stopped at Sugar Bowl for a Rhubarb Crumble ice cream cone on my way back through town. It’s a small ice cream shop with a dining area upstairs overlooking Water Street. My only complaint here was with myself: I didn’t order a glass of ice water to go with my ice cream. Always have a glass of ice water handy when you’re eating ice cream! Water never tastes better than it does while you’re eating ice cream.
From there I had nothing left but the arduous journey back to the airport. The morning’s “ups” are the afternoon’s “downs” and vice versa, but hills are hills and these hills are significant. I will strongly consider using a courtesy car next time I’m here.
All in all, Decorah was a fine place to spend a warm summer afternoon.
Appendices
- Airport WiFi: 161kbps download, unreliable, didn’t test upload.
- Tethering to my phone (AT&T network) was much faster.
- Photos
- Track logs
- YouTube