St. Louis, MO

We had another late night or I should say early morning of storms… thunder, lightening, and sheets of rain. We never heard rain like that. It was as if God turned on the faucet and let ‘er rip. Went on and on. It eventually stopped and then started up again a few hours later but at a lower decibel level.

Saturday, June 17th, we headed off in the morning to Babler State Park… outside St. Louis. We got just a few miles from the campground when a dog ran right out in front of us… scared the bejeezus out of us. Came from right to left… you could see him coming and running. Gary slowed down and laid on the horn and the dog just made it across. Whew.

We had a good drive, although very busy through Kansas City. Kansas, in their infinite wisdom, has tolls. We do not have a “K-Tag” to go through their automatic toll booths. But, you can go through anyway, and they’ll send you a bill. We opted to do that. I have a feeling whatever money we’ve been saving staying at these lovely Corp of Engineer parks for a whopping $18 a night or inexpensive state parks, we will pay to the state of Kansas for their tolls. We shall see.

Rest stops can be interesting experiences. We stopped at one and they had an Automatic Washer. You put your hands under it and out comes soap, then a moment later out comes water, then after that comes the dryer. For some reason, I felt like I was in an SNL skit…. a throw back to Dan Aykroyd and the bass-o-matic and Julia Child’s bleeding finger came to mind…

We arrived at Babler State Park around 3:30 in the afternoon. Super hot and muggy. Our site was a back-in (of course) at the end of a cul-de-sac. There was a nice couple in a big 5th wheel next to us. Just as we were getting ready to back-in, the husband came over and said watch out for that tree. It did damage to his roof because there were some low lying branches. Oh kay. We have enough trouble parking… never mind worrying about trees with low lying branches. It took a couple of tries but we got it in. Gary & I have different ideas about what’s acceptable. I’m good with us backing it in anywhere within our spot. He wants it on the concrete pads where it’s supposed to be. Picky, picky. After we got it backed in, I went over to visit with our neighbors. They are local and here for the weekend. They are looking to retire shortly and sell their home and live in their 5th wheel full time. Nice couple. (The husband complained about the tree and his roof damage to the campground host who then contacted management who got their tree people out and two days later that tree was gone. History. Chopped to the ground. Wow. They don’t mess around. Hope nobody complains about me.)

Most of the folks here were local from Missouri and apparently, regardless of the temps, love their campfires. They just sit back further from the fire. Weeelll, that’s one approach. We opted for a night inside in air conditioned comfort watching Seinfeld reruns. To each his own.

Once again it was a stormy night. That’s three nights in a row. We’re not used to this. But, we were comfy in our home. Another round of thunder, lightening, wind and heavy rain, although not as heavy as the night before.

Sunday, June 18th, the rains did take away most of the humidity and some of the heat. Yay! We decided to head to Forest Park, which is an enormous urban park in St. Louis. It is a wonder! It has the St. Louis Art Museum, a History Museum, Science Center, a zoo, golf, tennis, paddle boat rides, a theatre, a planetarium, walking and bike trails, and garden areas. Amazing! There’s a trolley that just covers Forest Park. You could easily spend several days just exploring Forest Park. We stopped to check out the visitor’s center, and, I promptly left my purse at the table we had been sitting at. Luckily I discovered it before too much time went by and quickly walked back to get it. Just as the people sitting at the table next to us were running to catch me to return it. People are kind. We wondered around for awhile walking Kya and admiring the gardens and boathouse area. And people admiring Kya and asking once again “what breed is she?” I should keep track of how many times that question gets asked in a single day.

We then headed over to the Laumeier Sculpture Park. A 105 acre outdoor park with large scale sculptures. We had fun admiring and, on occasion, poking fun at the art… depending on the piece. Art truly is in the eye of the beholder. Gary was channeling Steve Troy, his dad, a few times. “You call this art!” By then we were getting tired and came back to the campground to sit outside and relax.

Monday, June 19th, we decided to head to downtown St. Louis and try and see the Gateway Arch. That meant (1) leaving Kya for an extended period in the RV. We’ve left her for short periods before but not hours on end. This will be an experiment. And, (2) finding parking for the big dually in downtown St. Louis. I had checked at the Visitor’s Center for suggestions and since the Cardinals were not in town, they had suggested parking at Ballpark Village which is a stone’s throw from the Arch. We head off and do find ample parking at Ballpark Village. Sweet.

From research online, we know to head to The Old Courthouse to purchase tickets for the Gateway Arch. The Old Courthouse is a beautiful structure, on the historic registry, and the courtrooms are preserved in their historic splendor. Beautiful curved doors, murals on the inside… just lovely. A treasure really. We purchase our tickets for the Arch and explore the Old Courthouse. We befriend one of the security guards who answers a few of our questions and then he tracks us down to ask “did you notice the flags only have 32 stars?” No we did not. It’s because that’s how many states there were at the time that the courthouse was built. There were a ton of flags up and we were wondering if it was normal or because of the approach of July 4th. The guard had said actually it was because of Flag Day, which was about a week ago, and they are leaving them up now for the 4th.

We also had a private tour with Amy, a Park Ranger (originally from Mass.) on the Arch. The design of the Arch came from a winning contest entry that was done in the late 1940s. The powers-that-be had wanted to revitalize the waterfront area and thought a monument to Westward Expansion would be a great way to do it. Amy had pictures of the other runner up designs. The judges chose wisely with the Arch! The Arch stands 630 ft. tall and the same width. The shape is similar to a “weighted chain.” In other words if you wore a simple chain around your neck, that shape is the (upside down) shape of the arch. It’s the world’s tallest arch and the tallest man-made monument in the Western Hemisphere. Our tickets to enter the Arch are timed and not for a few hours yet so we head to the Eads Bridge. (Thank you Wayward for mentioning the bridge.)

This whole downtown waterfront area is part of the “Jefferson National Expansion Memorial.” The Eads Bridge was built in 1874 to span the Mississippi River and connect St. Louis and Illinois. It is a historic landmark and the world’s first all steel bridge. Beautiful design. We take pictures, admire the cobblestone streets, which remind us of Boston, and admire the old buildings, which also remind us of Boston.

Now it’s time for us to wonder back over to the Gateway Arch, stand in line underground (where it’s a construction zone because they’re re-doing the whole lower level museum), and ride our round 5-person pod aka coffin to the top. There are 8 of these pods/coffins in a row behind individual doors. The doors open and voila 5 tiny seats (smaller than toilet seat covers, which is what they look like) await us. There are five individuals in our group… me, Gary, a tiny little Asian woman traveling alone, and a large couple from California. This could be interesting. I position it so that the two boys aren’t sitting next to each other which proves helpful in getting us all to fit. Once we’re all seated, I keep up a constant stream of chatter for the 4-minute ride to the top so I don’t have to think about the size of the contraption we’re traveling in. We make it to the top and are standing in the rounded top portion of the Arch with 16 small windows to look out of. It’s actually a cool view from up there and the ride to the top is a unique experience for sure. I don’t need to do it everyday but I’m definitely glad we did it.

We get back down the same way we came up… in our little pod. This time we only had 4, rather than 5 in our traveling coffin.

Now we figure it’s time to head back to camp and check to see how Kya made out for the day. We walk back to the parking lot. It’s one of those where you have to pay at a kiosk before you walk back to your car. It’s broad daylight… but not terribly busy in this area. A man walks up to us at the kiosk and has a notebook, a veteran’s card and proceeds to shake my hand and introduces himself by name and says he’s a veteran, who has been left stranded today by the VA and needs o get back to his wife and kids who are 22 miles away. I’m waiting for him to ask us for a ride. I would have said no. I’m not a complete idiot. But, instead, he asks us for $17 and $17 only so he can get back to his family. While this is going on the stupid kiosk keeps rejecting our credit card. Apparently I’m an idiot after all because I give him the money. While I’m doling out $17, I’m asking Gary so “how’s that credit card payment coming along.” He finally got the American Express card to work and we hurried up out of there before anybody else asked us for money.

By the way, Kya was an angel while we were gone, so all perfect on the home front. We round out the day with a campfire that night.

Tuesday, June 20th, we head to the famous Anheuser Busch brewery for a tour. They’re located in an older section of St. Louis and take up a plethora of buildings in this area. One of the buildings we were in was built in 1891… beautiful brick work on the outside with interesting decorations adorning the buildings, and inside beautiful wrought iron railings. We got a lesson in how beer is brewed, and learned that after prohibition the Anheuser Busch Co. delivered beer to FDR at the White House via the Clydesdales. Must of been a site.

In my next life I want to come back as a Clydesdale horse and be stabled at the St. Louis stables. I’ll enjoy stained glass windows in my stables, all the hay I can possibly want, and be stabled with the largest contingent of Clydesdales in the world. Not bad. Seriously the stable was a thing of beauty!

After the brewery tour it was time to do some errands… laundry mainly, fill up on fuel, and get a few groceries before we head to Kentucky tomorrow.