mmegaera | Entries tagged with missouri

It was 90dF when I climbed into Merlin at 10 am just west of St. Louis, and the humidity was oppressive. And by oppressive I mean I felt like I had a coating of boiling lead all over my body, weighing me down [wry g]. This kind of weather is why I don’t visit my mother in Texas between Easter and Halloween.

But I made the best of it. I drove into downtown St. Louis, and wound up doing a sort of “Big Ben Parliament” thing (the reference is to the movie National Lampoon’s European Vacation, BTW) trying to find it. I kept seeing it, but trying to get close enough to it to actually walk up to it was – challenging. I never did get directly under it, even walking, because they’ve got the ground underneath it torn up while they redo the Museum of Westward Expansion, which is underground there and won’t be open again until 2017. But, after accidentally crossing over into Illinois and back again, I did manage to get close and find a parking place right next to the Old Courthouse, which is right across the street from the park leading to the Arch.

It’s every bit as impressive as I thought it would be. I thought it was going to be copper-colored, but I think that’s because the only other time I’ve ever seen it was from Amtrak’s Texas Eagle on the Illinois side of the Mississippi, right at sunset (which was admittedly pretty cool), years and years ago. It’s not coppery, it’s silver-colored. It shimmers. And it looks like a tornado would blow it right over. I kept thinking, where are the guywires?

The Arch from the steps of the Old Courthouse.

As close as I could get to the Arch without going up in it (not a chance -- I saw the thing you ride up in -- they had a mockup where they sold the tickets -- it made the Gemini capsule back in Kansas look ginormous. — As close as I could get to the Arch without going up in it (not a chance — I saw the thing you ride up in — they had a mockup where they sold the tickets — it made the Gemini capsule back in Kansas look ginormous).

The Old Courthouse across the street reminds me of the historic buildings in Boston and Philadelphia, dwarfed by the skyscrapers that surround them. This is where Dred Scott and his wife first sued for their freedom from slavery, and it was determined that they were not U.S. citizens, and so would not be freed.

One of the exhibits in the Old Courhouse, about the Oregon Trail.

Remnants of one of the earliest buildings in St. Louis, a fur trader's warehouse. — Remnants of one of the earliest buildings in St. Louis, a fur trader’s warehouse.

An interesting reflection of the Old Courthouse in one of the nearby skyscrapers. The statue is of Dred Scott and his wife.

There’s a nice museum inside the courthouse, mostly temporary, I gather, while the other museum is closed. It was interesting, but nothing I wasn’t already familiar with. The exhibits were well done, though.

After I staggered back to Merlin through the heat, I knew the Missouri Botanic Gardens were a no-go. After barely a block I was just miserable. So I decided to head on out of St. Louis. I was really disappointed about that. I probably would have stuck around if I’d known the weather would have cooled off in a day or two, but it’s supposed to be in the 90s the rest of this week, alas.

I crossed the Mississippi into Illinois on a bridge that looks like what the 21st Street bridge in Tacoma wants to be when it grows up, and saw a sign for the Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site. Hoping for an air-conditioned visitor center, I took the offramp only to discover it’s closed on Mondays. But I did take a brief look around, and then called my Bujold listee friend Jim Parish, who lives in a small college town just northeast of St. Louis.

One of the mounds at Cahokia, which is the largest pre-Columbian ruin north of Mexico. Including Mesa Verde, apparently.

I found his house just fine, and we went out to lunch. A long, lovely lunch, where we talked about everything from Bujold to family to history. I’m not really sure there was a subject we didn’t cover [g]. Jim’s the first person I’ve stopped to see on this trip, and it was so nice to see a friendly familiar face and talk with someone I’ve known (albeit mostly online) for years.

I didn’t leave until after 3:30, and I stopped at the local AAA office for my next round of maps and guidebooks (I ran out after Missouri), then headed out of town looking for a place to stay. Oh, and for a place to get Merlin’s oil changed for the first time.

I saw this while I was looking for a motel tonight. I've never seen a water tower painted to look like a bottle of ketchup before... — I saw this while I was looking for a motel tonight. I’ve never seen a water tower painted to look like a bottle of ketchup before…

I found the former, but not the latter, so I’ll have to do that tomorrow. Merlin now officially has 5000 miles on him. I’ve driven a bit over 4000 miles since I left home.

I then dithered about whether to go southeast, to Paducah, Kentucky, home of a nationally-recognized quilt museum, or northeast to Springfield, Illinois, where there’s a bunch of interesting Lincoln stuff. I could double back and do both, but for now I’m headed to Springfield tomorrow. There’s supposed to be some storms coming through tonight. I’m glad I’m indoors.

Mirrored from M.M. Justus -- adventures in the supernatural Old West.

Crossposts: http://mmegaera.livejournal.com/540378.html

I spent a second night in Hannibal, Missouri, after my adventures with my rib on Saturday, because I was too tired and sore after all that to go explore the town. Hannibal is where Mark Twain grew up, and he’s pretty much a cottage industry there. You can go explore the cave that was the prototype for the one in Tom Sawyer, you can visit a reconstruction of the shed where Jim’s prototype lived (I kid you not), etc., etc. Most of it was too gimcracky for words.

On the other hand, the Boyhood Museum (which contained a number of buildings, including a restoration of one of the houses (his father had a hard time earning a living and died when Sam was eleven) Twain grew up in, the house of the little girl he modeled Becky Thatcher on, and a reconstruction of the Blankenship cabin (Tom Blankenship was the boy Huckleberry Finn was based on, and he wasn’t quite as badly off as Huck growing up) was interesting and fun, and worth an hour or so.

The white house is one of several Twain lived in as a kid. The sign in front of the white fence says this is the one Tom Sawyer got everyone else to whitewash for him [g].

I know exactly what Twain meant when he said this. From inside the museum.

The "Huck and Tom" statue in downtown Hannibal. — The “Huck and Tom” statue in downtown Hannibal.

Oh, and there was a quilt shop across the street, which looked tiny from the outside, but inside was four huge rooms full of fabric. Yes, I bought two more half yards.

Thank you to Jane Hotchkiss for the lovely afternoon. She recommended that I take Missouri Route 79, which more or less follows the Mississippi River from Hannibal to St. Louis. It was a really pretty drive. The Mississippi is huge by the time it gets this far south, and this time of year it’s really, really full. Several viewpoints along the way provided great views (from at least one you could see at least fifty miles over into Illinois), and I thoroughly enjoyed myself. Also, the Mississippi River bluffs are really heavily wooded. All those curly-haired deciduous trees [g]. I bet that drive is spectacular in the autumn.

A glimpse of Old Man River. This time of year, as my friend Mary says of North Carolina where she lives, the forest is like a green wall on either side of the road. Only in a few places can you actually see any distance.

The Mississippi from a city park in the town of Louisiana, Missouri. It's funny to think about where some of that water came from -- some of it passed through the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, over Yellowstone Falls. — The Mississippi from a city park in the town of Louisiana, Missouri. It’s funny to think about where some of that water came from — some of it passed through the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, over Yellowstone Falls.

Tonight I’m in St Charles, Missouri (a western suburb of St. Louis), and tomorrow I’m going to go see the Gateway Arch! (I’ve been wanting to do that ever since I took Amtrak from Ohio to Texas to visit my parents years and years ago, and got a glimpse of the Arch from the train on the Illinois side of the river). Unfortunately, the museum underneath the arch is closed for renovation, and no, I’m not going up in the arch because I don’t do manmade heights and I’m slightly claustrophobic about manmade closed in spaces, but I want to walk under it and see it close up and personal.

I really want to go to the Missouri Botanic Gardens, too, but it’s 95dF and really humid, so we’ll see if I can manage that without melting in a puddle. They’re one of the oldest botanical gardens in the U.S. and are supposed to be really something.

And then it’s on to southern Illinois, where I plan to stop and see my fellow Bujold listee Jim Parish. It’ll be nice to be social again with a friend.

Mirrored from M.M. Justus -- adventures in the supernatural Old West.

Crossposts: http://mmegaera.livejournal.com/540050.html

So. It’s not a dislocated rib. It’s a cracked rib. Nothing to be done but take painkillers and be patient. It should be fine in 4-6 weeks, which means about the time I get to DC I should be in good shape again.

This throws a whole parade of monkey wrenches into the machinery, not the least of which is that I won’t be able to camp for the duration, which is going to make this trip quite a bit more expensive than I had planned. Nothing I can’t handle, but not how I wanted to spend the money. Not to mention that I really like camping, and it’s why I bought the van in the first place. Well, there will still be at least a couple of months for camping again once I’m well.

I’ve bought an industrial-sized bottle of Advil (the generic coatings don’t like my stomach, and prescription painkillers and I have a long and unhappy history). Wrapping, according to the AMA, is now frowned upon, so that’s that.

On the bright side, it does not hurt to drive. Merlin’s driver’s seat is very ergonomic for me (hits my back and seat in all the right places), and handling the controls does not hurt at all.

Also on the bright side, this is much better than my first Long Trip’s Official Disaster, which was rolling my car out in the Mojave Desert — you can read about that here, if you like.

Worse things have happened. I’m not going to let this ruin things. But please, don’t anyone tell my mother what happened [g].

Mirrored from M.M. Justus -- adventures in the supernatural Old West.

Crossposts: http://mmegaera.livejournal.com/539901.html

So. There’s a reason I haven’t been online in four days, and it’s not a good one. I slipped and fell out of the back of my van the day before yesterday onto an asphalt parking lot, and managed to dislocate my rib again in the process (as you can tell from the “again”, this isn’t the first time I’ve done this – the first time was about ten years ago, when I was recovering from shoulder surgery and overdid the physical therapy – my rib has been predisposed to further dislocations ever since). On the bright side, I was in a good-sized college town (Warrensburg, Missouri) at the time, and a good chiropractor was easy to find. He popped it back in, and I spent yesterday resting in a motel room (sans wifi, alas), but my muscles are still screaming sore if I move the wrong way (or sneeze, or blow my nose, or… — driving is fine, though, thank goodness). I also managed to bruise my tailbone, I have a small case of road rash on my left arm (I had a lump on my elbow for a few hours afterwards, but it’s gone now, and the arm works fine), and I bumped my head slightly (so slightly that it wasn’t even bruised). I’m going to be okay, but criminy.

Oh, well. Maybe this is this trip’s Official Disaster (for those who haven’t read Cross-Country, or heard me talk about it, that trip ended with me rolling my car out in the middle of the Mojave Desert in California – I was fine, the car was totaled).

Anyway, with that one exception, Mrs. Lincoln, the last three days have been fine, if way too hot for human beings (100 on the fifteenth, 10-bleeding-6 yesterday – both dF). It was too hot, even at eight in the morning, to go out and walk any distance at the Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve. Fortunately, the little road out to my campsite the night before (which was lovely once the sun went down and the temps dropped into the 70s dF) was lined with orange milkweed and purple coneflowers (another one which I now understand why it doesn’t like cool, damp western Washington), among other flowers.

Milkweed in bloom. First time I'd ever seen this one in the wild. — Milkweed in bloom. First time I’d ever seen this one in the wild.

I also saw a confection of a county courthouse in the small town on the way from the campground.

The county courthouse in Cottonwood Falls, Kansas.

Then I cut my losses and headed to Topeka.

Kansas’s state history museum is every bit as good as Washington’s, and that’s saying a fair amount. And their history is longer than ours, too (well, their documented history is, anyway). It started with the usual paleo-Indians, but where it really got interesting was during the years leading up to the Civil War. You’ve heard the term, “bleeding Kansas,” I’m sure, where people really got riled up (to the point of killing each other) over whether Kansas should come into the Union as a free or a slave state. This is where John Brown (of Harper’s Ferry fame) got his start, too.

Bison and horse statue outside of the Kansas History Museum.

The school building that houses Brown vs. Board of Education, NHS. It was a functioning school until 1976, the year before I graduated high school. — The school building that houses Brown vs. Board of Education NHS. It was a functioning school until 1976, the year before I graduated high school.

It was also really air-conditioned in there, as was the old schoolhouse that houses the Brown vs. Board of Education National Historic Site, although the NPS did that one with geothermal, which was pretty impressive. That’s in Topeka, too, and while calling some of the stuff that I actually remember historic just makes me feel old, the whole thing was really well done. It seems odd to me that the landmark civil rights Supreme Court case originated in the Midwest rather than the South, but that’s where it was.

After I left Topeka, I ended up on the Kansas Turnpike, which is a) really the only way to get to and through Kansas City, and b) the first more than five miles stretch of Interstate I’ve driven on the entire trip. There wasn’t even a Welcome to Missouri sign – my eighth state, and another one I’ve never been to before.

I got lost in Kansas City looking for the Arabia Steamboat Museum – I never did find it, much to my disappointment, because I think it would have been really interesting, but it was getting to be late in the day (aka rush hour), so I went on east into Missouri, found myself a motel in Warrensburg, and fell out of the back of my van.

This morning, after a second visit to the chiropractor to make sure the rib was still where it’s supposed to be (and to have a Tens unit attached to a spasming muscle in my back for a little while), I headed north by east to Hannibal, which means that yes, I’ve completely crossed the state of Missouri. I ate lunch in a café in a wide spot in the road, which was delicious, and also stopped in the hamlet of Florida, where Mark Twain was born. The actual cabin is inside of a museum <g>.

One of many reasons Mark Twain is one of my literary heroes.

The cabin where Twain was born. Presumably before they moved it into the museum . — The cabin where Twain was born. Presumably before they moved it into the museum [g].

Then I came on to Hannibal and found a motel (I’m not going to be camping again until I’m feeling better), and tomorrow I will explore where Samuel Clemens grew up. I’m really looking forward to that, even if it does look like they’ve made something of a cottage industry out of Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer here.

Mirrored from M.M. Justus -- adventures in the supernatural Old West.