The Amana Colonies
Pilot Knob State Park
You can visit Mason City and there is still some of the exteriors of the old movie The Music Man especially around the downtown park on Federal Avenue where U.S. 65 went before it was rerouted.
If you travel 10 miles west to Clear Lake go in the spring after the ice breaks out of the lake as it is one of the most beautiful little lakes in the state.
Iowa is still one of the untouch states that you still leave your car unlocked and it will still be there and your stuff will still be there when you come back to it.
You can go to Fertile a small hamlet north of Clear Lake, then travel east to a town called Manly, of course the local newspaper might have in the wedding notices a Manly man marries a Fertile woman....