There is a moment, somewhere around the third pedestrian bridge, when you stop thinking about where you parked your car, what you need to pick up at the grocery store, or whether you remembered to reply to that email. The Des Moines River slides past below you, catching the afternoon light in long gold ribbons, a kayaker drifts under the arch of the bridge, and the downtown skyline frames itself so neatly behind you that it looks almost too composed to be real. That is the moment the Principal Riverwalk gets you.
Stretching roughly two miles through the heart of downtown Des Moines, the Riverwalk is a paved, beautifully maintained path that traces both banks of the Des Moines River between the Court Avenue District and the Western Gateway neighborhood. It is free, it is open year-round, and it is one of the most underappreciated urban walks in the entire Midwest. People who have lived here for decades sometimes act surprised when a visitor brings it up, as though they forgot to mention an extraordinarily handsome painting hanging in their own front hallway.
The path itself is wide and smooth, welcoming joggers, cyclists, dog walkers, and anyone who simply wants to move through the city without being inside it. Interpretive signs along the way offer genuinely interesting snapshots of Des Moines history — the flood of 1993, the industrial legacy of the river corridor, the ecological recovery that turned a once-neglected waterway into a habitat worth watching. Great blue herons are a regular sighting. In spring, the cottonwood trees release their cottony clouds over the water in a way that feels almost theatrical.
The bridges themselves deserve their own attention. Several are designed with pedestrians in mind, offering elevated vantage points that reframe the city in ways you simply cannot get from street level. The MLK Jr. Parkway Bridge and the footbridges near the DART Central Station area give you the kind of sweeping perspective that makes you reach for your phone, not to scroll, but to take a photograph.
Connecting to the Riverwalk is easy from multiple entry points — near the Western Gateway Park, from the Court Avenue Entertainment District, or from the Nollen Plaza area. Pair a walk with a stop at one of the nearby restaurants or coffee shops and you have yourself a genuinely satisfying afternoon. On evenings when a concert or event is running at a nearby venue, the Riverwalk hums with a relaxed, convivial energy that is hard to manufacture and impossible to fake.
What makes the Principal Riverwalk worth telling people about is not any single dramatic feature. It is the cumulative effect of good design, natural beauty, and the particular pleasure of moving through a city at a human pace. Des Moines invested in this corridor, and it shows in every planting, every bench placement, every clean stretch of pavement. Come for a quick thirty-minute loop and you will find yourself planning a second pass before you have even finished the first.
