Missed it by that much

By Makayla Secrist Staff Writer

This year has brought on a lot of trouble for the world. Iowa has been no exception. The state has faced shut downs from COVID-19, the election year smear campaigns, and most recently something called a derecho.

Iowa has derechos (inland hurricanes) at least once every year, but in true 2020 fashion this was a rare, exceptionally furious storm. 100mph winds flipped cars over, snapped powerlines all over the state, and flattened an estimated 10 million acres of crops.

With farmers still dealing with the damage, they’ve now had to contend with a drought. According to drought.gov 6.5% of Iowa is in “extreme drought” and 22.8% in a state of “severe drought.” There has been astronomical amounts of damage to towns and crops this year, so how have our state parks in the Iowa Lakes area faired?

Apparently, they’re perfectly fine. The bulk of the storm missed them, “I mean we lost a couple of limbs, but nothing significant,” said Heath Gravert, one of the rangers in the Okoboji area, “It was pretty tame for us up here we really lucked out.”

The drought has barely touched them, “We do not have [a fire ban] currently in this county,” said Gravert. The grass is still vividly green, a little crunchy in areas.

Even the COVID-19 shut downs haven’t put a damper on business for the parks. Gravert explained that though in the beginning, they were shut down to all but construction and health care workers, the park reopened again in early May. “We’ve been pretty much open for most of the season,” said Gravert.

He went on to explain that the camp grounds have actually been packed since their reopening, “Minnesota, a lot of their facilities are shut down still so we got a lot out of state Minnesotans that have come down to camp.”

The only numbers that are down for the seasons bookings are the lodges, “The camping’s been fantastic,” said Gravert, “the lodge use on the other hand like our lodges stayed shut down for a longer period a longer period of time, but I think we started opening them toward the end of May.”

Gravert explains that though the lodges have been open, due to social distancing laws and regulations, people are postponing their weddings that the lodges are primarily used for. The parks’ staff is also way down for this year due to COVID-19.

Though not completely without trouble, the Iowa Great Lakes parks have been relatively untouched by recent events. Here’s to the end of what has been repeatedly voted “the worst year ever” and may any future troubles continue to pass them by.