Day 8: St. Louis, MO to Louisville, KY, 6 hours

We had big plans for this morning—ascending the St. Louis Arch!



It was already scorching hot by the time we got to the arch at 9:15. Luckily, the line wasn’t very long, and we already had tickets, so we didn’t have to wait long in the heat.

Edra and I were both a little nervous about going to the top, and she still hadn’t committed to going, even though we were already in line. On the ticket lady’s advice, she checked out a replica of the archway cars to reassure herself, but I refused to look for the same reason. I’d decided to go up no matter what, and I was afraid if the replica was too small or claustrophobic, I’d back out. I steeled my nerves, wiped off my sweaty palms and pushed on.

Life-size replica of the cars that climb the arch. They put FIVE people in there at a time!

The cars were indeed scary!!! They were egg-shaped, tiny, and had a definite space-travel vibe to them. Once the doors closed, the car slowly started rocking up and down, then back and forth. I’d expected a straight-up elevator type ride, but it was more of a slow, steady climb, in an upwardly zig-zag motion. There was a window that opened out to a dusty staircase, presumably used if the rickety egg acted up. I could feel the panic rising, and closed my eyes.

Inside the "egg"

A super nice man and his teen aged granddaughter rode up with us. We kept up a nervous chatter to take our minds off the fact that were slowly climbing up a 630 feet metal arch in an egg.

Four minutes later, we arrived at the top. The egg popped open and we entered the viewing area. It was a skinny room with viewing windows and a low ceiling. I’m pretty short, so the room was tall enough for me, but some of the men definitely had to bend down as they walked.

We made it to the top of the arch! This is inside the observation area.

There were a lot of people in the little space, and they were just as excited as we were. It was pretty awesome to look out the window and see the view from so high above—I could see our hotel, and the baseball stadium. I also saw the courthouse, and all the downtown buildings. But coolest of all was this shadow, which reminded me that I wasn’t just looking out any old building window:




We moved to the other side, which had a river view. You could see that St. Louis had not been spared the flooding; water rose up over the frontage road, right up to the park. Where there had once been a road, there were now underwater trees.

I’m really glad I ignored my fear and went up there. I didn’t even know you could go to the top of the arch until a couple months ago, but I’m so glad that you can. I would totally recommend going up, the view was spectacular.

Another happy surprise was the National Park museum below the arch, dedicated to Lewis and Clark, who started their expedition to the Pacific Coast in St. Louis. The museum had great exhibits of what they saw, and letters they wrote describing their trip. We’d covered a lot of the trail on our drive to St. Louis, so it was cool to read about the prairies and land we’d just traveled, and how different it all was when Lewis and Clark blazed the path.

Our Lewis and Clark impression--"Go West, young man!"

Then it was on to our next destination city, Louisville, KY. Until yesterday, we’d traveled through big states—maybe two states at a time on a really long day. But the states were getting much smaller, and we traveled through them quickly. Our ignorance of geography became embarrassingly apparent today, as we spent the day saying things like, “We’re in Illinois? I thought we were in Indiana!” or “Are you sure we’re even going to Indiana?”

We made a pit stop at a Burger King somewhere in Southern Illinois. It was a little tiny town, just a main street with two intersecting cross roads and a stop light. One older guy walked by with his grandkids, and marveled at our license plate.

“You drove all the way here from California?” he asked, in disbelief. I nodded, and he shook his head, and apologized to me, saying, “Well, we ain’t got nothin’ to show ya here!” He was right; you could turn your head and see the entire town without moving.

We entered Kentucky in the afternoon. It was weird—the minute we crossed the border, we saw shirtless men everywhere. I’m usually a big fan of shirtless men, but these were not the types anyone wanted to see. One beat up old truck passed us by with four—FOUR!—shirtless men crammed into the cab together. I don’t know if they have hillbillies in Kentucky, but if so, we literally saw a whole truckload of them.

The gas stations were also interesting in that you could buy not just gas, but also hunting and fishing licenses inside. And people were certainly buying them—lots of guys in camouflage loitered outside the store. And every good hunter needs a snack—in Kentucky, this was the snack of choice:




Kentucky also marked the final time change for us, to Eastern time. We lost an hour when rolled into Louisville, but it was okay. We’d be in town for two nights—two long, luxurious nights!—so trading one lost hour for a whole day of not driving was a deal.

Our hotel was quite shocking at first. It had two giant towers, each one bigger than any place we’d stayed in the whole trip so far. They were connected by a giant atrium over the street, again probably bigger than our other hotels. And it was filled with teenagers in brightly colored shirts—they were everywhere, attending a Nazarene youth conference. The kids were in big groups all over the hotel—in the lobby, at the elevators, in the hallways, running or texting or jumping on each other. I think we saw more people in the lobby alone than we had seen anywhere else in the country.

The girl at the hotel desk gave us a map and dinner recommendations. Although we were smack dab in the middle of downtown Louisville, it was eerily quiet. The architecture was amazing—lots of old brick buildings with elaborate trim. But they were empty, as were the streets, which should have been teeming with people going home from work. We’d seen a lot of cities that were affected by the recession, but Louisville and its deserted streets seemed especially hard-hit.

The concierge had recommended a barbecue joint, Doc Crow’s. The menu looked good, so we ambled inside to sample the local cuisine.

It was another AMAZING dinner, definitely giving the Kansas City lunch some competition. Edra ordered fried pork rinds as an appetizer, and though Mark was doubtful, he tried and liked them (man, did they gross me out!).

Mark is a little dubious of fried pork rinds...

I ordered the smoked turkey, which was heavenly, and Edra ordered shrimp and grits, which was also fantastic. I’m not much of a grits fan, but these were smothered in cheese, and when served with the spicy shrimp, they just melted in your mouth. We also ordered a bunch of side dishes—sweet potato fries, hush puppies, and green beans for Mark, who needed some vegetables. But our good intentions of feeding him something healthy were nixed when the beans arrived, swimming in what tasted like bacon grease (boy, were they good!!).

Happy and full, we returned to the hotel. Mark was itching to get into the swimming pool, the first outdoor pool we’d seen. I was excited, too, because after seeing this picture on the web site, I couldn’t wait to admire that bridge and river view.




What the picture didn’t show, however, was the freeway just below the pool! That’s right, between the pool and that view was an 8-lane freeway, with lots of loud, smelly cars honking and rushing past. So much for a peaceful view!

But I did get a view of one other thing I wasn’t expecting—a lighthouse! That’s right, I kept seeing a flashing light on top of a nearby office building in downtown, nowhere near the water’s edge. I assumed it was an airplane warning light at first, but when I looked again, I could tell it was actually a lighthouse, complete with stripes and a rotating light.




Which just cracked me up, because not only was the lighthouse in the middle of downtown, it was also about 30 stories high on the building. Seemed a funny place to put a lighthouse, but then, after a trip full of jackalopes, corn palaces and statues carved into mountains, I wasn’t sure what was even unusual or weird anymore.

Day 7: Sioux Falls, SD, to St. Louis, MO: 11 (or 12?) hours

When we planned the trip, we counted in three long driving days; the first one (8 hours to Grand Canyon) was behind us, and today we readied for the second one (9 hours).

What we didn’t plan on was the Midwest flooding. Or detours. Today, we got both.

We were on the road before the sun came up. Mark did great—he went to bed late, and I worried the early morning would make him cranky. But he simply moved from the bed to the car and immediately fell back asleep.

Yesterday, all South Dakota had to offer visually was the plains—wide, empty prairies wherever you looked. Today, as we crossed into Iowa, the view changed a bit—now the prairies were filled up with corn, corn as far as you could see in every direction. (Edra changed her “360 degree view of nothing” observation to “360 degree view of..corn!”)

Our constant companion for the next few days...corn!

It was astounding how much corn was out there. Edra and I thought of one local guy who said we should sell our corn to oil-producing countries for the same amount they charged us for oil. It seemed like a reasonable plan to us.

We stopped three hours later for gas. Edra filled up the car, and Mark was still sleeping, so I went inside the store. I was searching the aisles when Edra said, “C’mon, let’s go, time to get back on the road.” I turned around to see not just my friend, but also my son sipping on electric blue slushies. It was 9:15 in the morning!




I just cracked up. A few days early, Edra had admitted to a slushie craving, and jokingly said she was gonna get one for breakfast. Mark immediately answered, “And I will go with you!” I reasoned it was just like drinking a Jamba Juice, except, you know, the slushie was loaded with food coloring, had no vitamins, no nutritional value, and twice the sugar as a Jamba Juice. But other than that, they were similar, right? And hey, what’s a vacation without a breakfast slushie??

Pretty soon, the corn gave way to another view—water. It was weird, trees seemed to grow right in the middle of the river, and I wondered how that was possible. They didn’t look like swamp plants. low with sprawling roots; they looked like all the other trees on the side of the road.

But then we passed a small town where not only the trees were underwater, but most of the buildings were as well. Walls of sand bags lined the buildings, unsuccessful fortresses that failed to keep out the rising tide. You could see that the bottom floors were underwater, as were the roads and homes surrounding them. What had simply been a story on the nightly news in California (record flooding in the Midwest!) became horrifically, unbelievably real in Iowa.

The devastation was everywhere—we passed more towns underwater, more roads and trees swallowed up by the swollen river. We could see the flooded cornfields—they grew in the middle of huge lakes, the plants yellowed and dying from overwatering. Then, nearby, we’d see a little farmhouse, and our hearts would break, thinking of the loss those poor farmers faced, and how their livelihood and dreams had drowned with their crops. We saw signs along the road asking for support, including one that said, “Pray for the farmers.” Though I’m not normally a religious person, I complied. I hoped the over saturated land would dry out soon, and that those farming families recovered quickly.

Even the roads were affected. Some sections reminded me of driving in the Everglades—the water creeped right up to the edge of the road. I realized one small misstep, and the car could easily slide off the road, and into the deep water. That made me concentrate even harder on driving as safely as possible. At a couple parts, the water was actually above the road—a temporary barrier had been built to shield the road from the water, and we drove below “sea” level.

Our trusty GPS, Adele, got all the way to Iowa without once getting lost. However, she did not count on the flooding, either. Road closures and detour signs popped up, re-routing us from the flooded highways on to tiny rural roads. Adele protested, recalculating over and over again, insisting we make a legal U-turn when possible. We finally turned down her volume, following the 18-wheelers and the detour signs instead.

I tried finding our location on the road atlas, but couldn’t figure out where the heck we were. The roads we drove were so small, so rural, they weren’t even listed on the map!

I couldn’t even figure out what state we were in—I was pretty sure we were in Nebraska, until we hit a tiny town named Clarinda, which proudly proclaimed to be the birthplace of Glen Miller. We drove along Glen Miller Road, until suddenly, out of nowhere, we saw a sign welcoming us to Missouri. I didn’t even know we were anyway near Missouri! I double-checked the atlas, confirmed Clarinda actually was in Iowa, and that we were on the correct route now. Edra, smart girl that she is, began to doubt my navigational skills. She silently turned Adele’s volume back up, and instead of being insulted, I was relieved.

The detour took us two hours out of our way. Which would have been a bummer on any other day, but adding two more hours to an already long day made us all a little crazy.

After seven hours of driving, we rolled into Kansas City, MO. We were hungry, a bit gritchy, and really needed to get out of the car for awhile. A short consultation with Yelp! helped choose a barbecue place, and drove into the lot, mouths already watering in anticipation.

It wasn’t quite what we expected—we’d hoped for a local dive with amazing barbecue for a steal. Instead, the restaurant was a bit fancier, filled with business people and white linen tablecloths. Luckily, it wasn’t as pricey as it looked.

Mark and Edra ordered the ribs, and I had barbecued chicken and smoked turkey. It was all amazing! It was seriously the best chicken AND turkey I’ve ever had, all at the same time!

We also ordered beans, which were seriously fantastic, a word I would never have used to describe beans before today. And to top it off, we had some kind of creamed corn smothered in cheese, with bits of ham inside. Again, not much into ham or creamed corn, but I would have licked that bowl clean had it been a less fancy joint.

This was the best meal we’d had the whole trip, hands down. We’d been subsisting on free hotel breakfasts, PB&Js and granola bars, and this was a far cry from any of that. I wanted to just lie down at the table afterwards and nap, it was that good.

But we had some serious miles to cover before nightfall. So it was back to the car, where we headed East toward St. Louis.

All the miles made us loopy. We got a little punch-drunk from driving so long, to the point where even a silly comment or the billboards sent us into hysterics. Here are a couple of our favorites:

I'm sorry, is this supposed to make me hungry???

The doc's parents really liked alliteration.

Finally, finally, we passed the Welcome to St. Louis sign. It was gray and overcast, but we searched for the iconic landmark. And then, there it was, the giant silver arch, looming high, right next to the freeway. We all cheered!

As we exited into the city, and we saw hordes of people in red shirts walking around. “Maybe there’s a Cardinals game tonight,” I said. “I wonder if the stadium’s nearby?” Then Edra turned the corner, and there it was, right in front of us—Busch Stadium!

We checked into our hotel, right around the block, and learned that we’d missed happy hour (and dinner) by 15 minutes. After 13 long hours, we were not happy about that, even when the concierge offered us free popcorn and sodas.

However, we were pretty stoked about the view from our room:




I was so excited I sent the picture to my sis-in-law, who promptly texted back, “Where’s the other half?” I replied, “Budget cuts,” which cracked her up.

All three of us needed to stretch our legs. We walked back to the stadium, where scalpers were selling tickets to the baseball game. Edra asked one how much, and he looked us over, then finally said, “For you, $15 each.” But we couldn’t fathom the thought of sitting down any longer, and we kept on walking. I heard the guy offer the same tickets to another family right afterwards for $10 each. Guess it was pretty obvious we were out-of-towners!

It was hot and HUMID in St. Louis. I didn’t notice as we walked, but the minute we stopped, we were drenched. Like, irrationally drenched, as in, “We only walked a block, why are we sweating like pigs???”

Mark and Edra admiring the arch at sunset

We walked by a cool-looking courthouse, which turned out to be a very famous historical site. It was the courthouse where slave Dred Scott had sued for his freedom, only to be shot down by the court, who ruled that that held that blacks could not be citizens of the United States. This decision led to Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, and eventually to the Civil War. (This is my childish, fifth-grade historical version of a hugely important case—treat it as you would an ignorant little child regaling you with history lessons.)

The court house

Mark had little interest in history or the cool local architecture. He’d been a trooper in the car all day long, so we ended the night at his favorite place, the swimming pool.

He frowned when he put on his bathing suit, and remarked that he wasn’t getting as tan as he usually does on vacation.

“That’s because all the pools are indoors,” I reminded him.

It’s hard to get a tan when you’re not outside. But on the upside, there are virtually no mosquitoes or humidity in the indoor pools—the chlorine-drenched air is a might bit stifling, but hey, it keeps the bugs away.