15 Things We Loved About Savanna, Illinois

Having spent six weeks in Wisconsin on our 5 year, 50 state road trip, we crossed the border and headed to Savanna, Illinois – the first city we’d be visiting in our 7th state.

Ending up in Savanna was something that happened randomly. We’d already planned out the other cities we’d be visiting in Illinois, but had a week in July still to be booked. The only region of the state we didn’t have covered was the northwest, so that’s where we focused our attention.

There weren’t any good value options for using our hotel points, so we turned to Airbnb. One of the reasons I love Airbnb is that you can easily search for properties by region. Their website allows you to zoom in and out on a map and it’ll list all the properties in that area that fit your criteria.

Spending a week somewhere meant we wanted to have the property all to ourselves. There ended up being a nicely priced property in Savanna, so we looked into the city. There was a state park nearby and it was by the river, so we figured we could find some fun stuff to do there. If nothing else, we could just have a relaxing week or focus on working on our websites.

As it turns out, there’s a surprising number of fun things to do in this small city of ~3,000 people. So here’s a list of 15 things we loved about Savanna, Illinois.

1) Mississippi Palisades State Park

Savanna is home to Mississippi Palisades State Park, a 2,500 acre state park next to the Mississippi River. If you’re into camping, they have more than 200 camping spots, including electrical hookups at about half of them.

I took our dog Truffles for a hike there as it has numerous hiking trails. We didn’t get a chance to check out many of the trails, but the Sunset Trail is definitely worth doing. It’s a mile-long loop and has a couple of overlooks with stunning views of the Mississippi River.

An added bonus is that there’s no fee to enter Mississippi Palisades State Park, a welcome relief from the $11-$13 fees we had to pay at every state park we visited in Wisconsin.

2) Great River Road

The Great River Road is a road that follows the course of the Mississippi River for thousands of miles. Needless to say, the road is extremely popular with bikers and passes through Savanna on its way south.

3) Iron Horse Motorcycle Museum

Due to all the bikers passing through the city along the Great River Road, Savanna caters to motorcycle enthusiasts. One example is inside the Iron Horse Social Club as they have a free motorcycle museum.

The museum is spread across a couple of levels in the bar and is fun to check out while you have a drink.

We’d noticed there were some stairs leading up to a third floor, but we didn’t explore up there. It looks like that was a mistake as it turns out that Iron Horse Social Club has a wedding chapel up on the third floor!

4) Poopy’s Pub N’ Grub

Iron Horse isn’t the only place in Savanna that’s popular with bikers. Poopy’s Pub N’ Grub is a huge biker bar and restaurant that has live music at weekends.

We went there for dinner and the food was excellent, so check out our full review of Poopy’s. If you visit, be sure to have The Big Poop – a delicious 1 lb burger.

5) Great River Trail

In addition to the Great River Road, Savanna is the start point of the Great River Trail, a 60 mile trail that’s popular with bikers of the pedaling variety.

Crossing over a covered bridge, you follow a paved trail that’s perfect for biking on. I went for a short jog on the trail and the section I was on ran alongside and over water, giving nice views with a fair bit of shade from the overhanging trees.

6) Sunsets Over The River

The Mississippi River runs along the west side of Savanna, meaning you get some beautiful sunset views.

Some of the bars and restaurants on Main St have decks looking out over the river. It’s therefore worth enjoying an drink outside in the evening as the sun goes down.

7) Bar Crawl

Main St in Savanna IL is home to loads of bars. Shae and I therefore decided to go on a bar crawl one night to check out several of them, although we didn’t get as far down the street as we’d anticipated!

We started off at Manny’s Pizza which offers $1.99 frozen margaritas on Fridays, then on to Iron Horse Social Club before heading a few doors down to Hawg Dogs. While having a drink there, we got chatting to Sandy who invited us to go with her to karaoke across the street at A.O. Elliott.

I’d never inflict my voice on anyone, but Shae has a great voice so she sang Before He Cheats by Carrie Underwood, then Let It Go from Frozen. Here’s a video of her letting it go after a few drinks:

8) Great Airbnb

Despite only being a small city, there are a few Airbnb properties available to rent. Our host James owns a few of them and I’d highly recommend staying in one of his places.

Here’s the place we stayed at which was perfect for our needs. It’s a one bedroom apartment with kitchen, living room, dining room, bathroom, etc. and a Smart TV for Netflix, Hulu, etc. There was also a fenced-in backyard which we appreciated seeing as we have a small dog.

It’s within walking distance of Sullivan Foods (the local grocery store) in one direction and downtown in the other, so you don’t have to worry about getting a taxi home after a night out. James is also very friendly, helpful and always replied incredibly quickly when we had questions.

It cost less than $65 per night for our week-long stay which was excellent value.

9) Independent Stores & Restaurants

Other than a Subway and BP gas station, I don’t remember seeing any other chains in Savanna. All the stores and restaurants seemed to be independently owned which was nice to see.

10) Wineries Nearby

Although there didn’t seem to be any wineries in Savanna, there were several within 15-30 minutes. On our way out of town at the end of our stay, we stopped by Rocky Waters Vineyard & Winery in Hanover.

A wine tasting session only costs $6.50 per person and includes 14 different wines. The pours are small enough though to ensure that you won’t be over the limit if you have to drive afterwards.

Rocky Waters has some tables and chairs outside with beautiful views of the surrounding area where you can enjoy a glass of wine and have lunch. They offer pizza, or you can sit out there with your own packed lunch.

11) Live Music

If you visit Savanna at the weekend, you should be able to catch some live music. There was a Def Leppard cover band at Poopy’s when we visited on a Saturday night, while Iron Horse had a decent cover band playing there on a Sunday afternoon.

12) Ca. 1888

Ca. 1888 is a new restaurant on Main St, Savanna. We went for Sunday brunch where I had a delicious salmon salad on ciabatta and Shae got a tasty flatbread. Check out our review of Ca. 1888 here.

13) College Street Creations

If you’re feeling crafty, head to College Street Creations where you can get creative and make your own decorative stuff.

Shae spent a couple of hours there with the owner Elizabeth and was able to make a couple of great pieces – here’s more about her experience.

14) Friendly People

We got to meet loads of great people during our week in Savanna. We happened to meet the mayor a couple of times, several of the servers at the bars we visited were friendly and we had a great couple of hours hanging out with Sandy on our bar crawl. James – our Airbnb host – was wonderful, as was Elizabeth at College Street Creations.

15) On The Iowa Border

On the opposite side of the Mississippi River is Iowa, with a bridge connecting Savanna with the Iowan island city of Sabula.

The old bridge was closed towards the end of 2017 which is when a new bridge was supposed to open. Construction delays have resulted in that date being pushed back, so when we visited there was a free ferry service across the river.

We took the ferry across as foot passengers and spent a couple of hours walking around Sabula. The city is only 1.26 square miles, so you can see most of it within that time. If you decide to head across to Sabula, be sure to stop for ice cream at Korner Stop Ice Cream Shop on the corner of Broad St and Sycamore St.

Truffles wanted a small vanilla cone of her own, so she decided to treat us.

Question

So those are 15 things we loved about Savanna, Illinois but how about you? If you’ve been to Savanna or live there, what was – or is – your favorite part? Let us know in the comments below.