The Choose Iowa Fall Crawl Can Turn Your Weekend into a Family Adventure

If you have been looking for a good excuse to get out of the house and explore Iowa this fall, here it is. The second annual Choose Iowa Fall Crawl is happening Friday and Saturday, October 9th and 10th, with over 130 Choose Iowa members ready to welcome visitors. That means this could be a great weekend to grab the family, load up the car, and see what's happening in a different parts of our great state.

You could visit an apple orchard, check out a pumpkin patch, wander through a farmers market, stop at a farm store, grab something made right here in Iowa, or find a new favorite place you didn't know existed. There is also a little extra incentive to keep exploring. Check the graphic below for a full list of places and points up for grabs!

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The free Choose Iowa Passport lets you check in at participating locations and earn points along the way. Each stop has its own point value, so the more places you visit, the more points you can collect. You can keep earning points through December 31, 2026. And those points can actually get you something.

What Do My Choose Iowa Passport Points Get Me?

Well, the rewards can only be found after grabbing the guide (so do it!), but here's the basics. Rewards currently range from 100 points to 2,500 points. For example, 100 points can get you a mini jar of Holton Homestead honey, an Iowa Craft Meats pork stick, or a Rhubarb Botanicals herbal salve.

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If you keep banking those points, at 500 you can choose from culinary lavender, beef jerky, or Clear Creek Orchard jam. There are also 700-point rewards, like hot and creamed honey. If you're really stacking the points, rewards go all the way up to 2,500 points. That can get you a 24-pack bundle of Iowa Craft Meats pork sticks. Plus, there are plenty of other options, including popcorn, lemonade mix, assorted honey, tea, and wheatgrass juice powder.

The best part is that you don't have to make the whole weekend about collecting points. The Passport is really just another reason to get out and discover Iowa. The Fall Crawl is self-guided, so you can choose the stops that sound interesting and make your own adventure. Just remember that each location sets its own hours and activities, so check out the location before heading there.

And if you find a place you love, you may have just discovered your new favorite Iowa fall tradition. My Iowa traditions take me to lot of these destinations, but now I have even more to discover, with a pretty good chance to score some rewards! What's your next Iowa adventure look like?