Day Two--Joplin to St. Louis

Greetings from St. Louis! We hit the road this morning at 8:10. Scott was very pleased with us because we only missed his estimated departure time by 10 minutes. Apparently he wasn't too concerned with the times he had on his Excel spreadsheet (oh yes!) because he was the one wanting to stop at every roadside attraction we passed. Our first trip off the beaten path was to the Fantastic Caverns just 10 minutes off the highway before we got to Springfield. I have to say I was skeptical...not such a big fan of caves...but this one is only one of three caverns in the world that you can drive into, so I agreed. We had few minutes before the tour started so we grabbed our jackets (temperature in the cavern is 60 degrees year round) and played around in the gift shop.

Mandy was very nervous and apprehensive about entering the cave. "It's going to be very scary."

Thomas and Grace weren't scared at all and Thomas had his camera all ready. He took tons of pictures today. At one point they actually let you touch the ceiling of the cavern. This is a BIG no-no when touring caverns (we learned that at Carlsbad last year) as it turns the stalagtiteness (slimy rock)brown.

They have this big room called the auditorium because in the very early 70's they held a radio show every Friday and Saturday night. It starred Buck Owens and a bunch of other people that my Grandaddy Rollins used to listen to when I was a little girl. It was the beginning of Ozark music. I thought that part was pretty cool....you know the history part!

Scott's next excursion was to a candy factory he'd been seeing the billboards for for 30 miles or so. The kids had a blast filling their bags with all sorts of candies.

Next came the really long drive to St. Louis. Long because it was POURING rain and traffic was terrible. We passed several wrecks. Scott wants be to be sure and let you know that Missouri has the worst drainage he's ever seen on it's highways!

We had dinner downtown at the Spaghetti Factory where Mandy had, "...the best applesauce of my life." Then, we drove down to the waterfront to see the Gateway Arch. At first glance, Scott said, "All that rain really has the Mississippi up." Then, we realize just how much rain they had gotten when we passed this...

I have no idea who the statue is of, or what it represents, just that is was about 6 feet under water! Apparently, on a normal day you can walk down to the shores of the Mississippi, today the water was even with the road in some places.

We parked right along the riverfront, since not many people wanted to see the St. Louis arch in the rain. While we were looking for a place to park Scott and I were telling the kids about the Mississippi River....it's muddy...it flows to the Gulf of Mexico...and about how strong the current is. I made the offhand comment that it was like a really, really strong undertow at the beach and if you got caught in the water it would pull you under. When we finally parked Scott said,"Let's go down to the water" to which Mandy screams in panic, "No! I don't want to go in there, I'll die!" We calmed her down and took the pictures above so everyone could see how high the river is!

It stopped raining long enough for us to stroll by the water and hike up to the arch.

For some reason I always thought the arch was made of stone, like the Washington monument. However, it's actually stainless steel and there is absolutely no way to capture the massiveness (?) of it. It's definitely something you have to see in person to fully appreciate. Framed under the arch in the background is the courthouse where the Dred Scott case took place...just in case there are any other history nuts like myself reading this....

Next came the part I'd been dreading....the tram ride to the top. "Tram" in my opinion, is very optimistic for what it is...

It's more like a pod and it feels like your on a 4 minute ferris wheel ride. Fortunately, I'm not claustrophobic. However, I am afraid of heights. Once we got to the top I was immediately ready to come down. It's very small, the windows are minuscule and while we were up there it started to rain again...which brought wind. Know what happens to a 630 foot tall arch when the wind blows???? It moves. Ever so slightly, but it definitely moves. The (crazy) people who work up there thought it was cool. The kids looked at the windows for a few minutes and then Grace was ready to come down too. We had to wait on Thomas though, he wasn't quite through looking.

Thomas's Top Five for June 6, 2008

1. Seeing the Arch.

2. Eating dessert at the restaurant.

3. Fantastic Caverns.

4. Getting our caricature done.

5. Going to the candy factory.

Grace's Top Five for June 6, 2008

1. The cave.

2. Getting our picture drawn. (For Grace's souvenir today she chose to have their caricature done while we were at Union Station. The artist was great with them and her portrait turned out SO cute! She made a great choice to spend her money on today.)

3. The Arch.

4. The candy shop.

5. Working on my scrapbook. (I bring those spiral bound scrapbooks and they put their ticket stubs, postcards and write or draw something each night before they go to bed.)

Tomorrow if the weather is decent we are going to the St. Louis Zoo. Afterwards we are headed to Chicago!

Blessings,

Leslie