BURLINGTON — My favorite part of any trip is getting home.

I mean, it’s fun to go somewhere, see the sites, meet the people and maybe learn something new. But I always feel glad to get back to Ottumwa.

So because some people say Burlington is like a slightly larger version of Ottumwa, my wife, Carrie, and I thought it could make the perfect short trip on a recent vacation day. And we made it up and back on less than one tank of gas, including a foray into nearby Illinois.

We didn’t do everything we could have done in Burlington.

For one thing, we skipped anything that would cost money, because I had put most of our “disposable” cash in our gas tank. There’s some nice restaurants in Burlington, too, but we had a big lunch on the way. We didn’t hit the casino, the antique shops or the ball field.

And we didn’t go to Snake Alley, “famous” because it takes about 275 feet of walking to move 58 feet up a hill.

But even without visiting “The Crookedest Street in the World,” we still had a good time.

Mostly, we relaxed at Crapo Park. After we got back to Ottumwa, I was told the wife and I had been completely mispronouncing the name. Turns out the “Crap” in Crapo rhymes with the word tape. Luckily, no Burlingtonians heard what we had innocently been calling it.

We found out about the park at the Port of Burlington Welcome Center, a neat historic building with train tracks out front and the Mississippi River out back

One visitor there, perhaps a native, insisted we go check out Burlington’s “great library.” We didn’t. Another said we could see eagles from the back deck. We couldn’t. But we loved the view of the river. And we enjoyed watching a few amateur photographers shooting the wild-looking bridge which, they insisted, was headquarters for a whole bunch of eagles.

Man: “Look, they’re right there!”

Me: “Where?”

Man: “There, don’t you see them?”

Me: “No...”

Man: “There, there!”