Muddy Waters, Stainless Steel, Maple and Walnut
October 3, 2023 – Day 5
Today was the day we were going to do things! We planned on going into St. Louis, get tickets to ride to the top of the Arch, visit the museum and then off to the St. Louis Chess Club Museum. (paul here: Yeah, chess museum/hall of fame. Fight me.)
It turns out you can get to the top of the Arch if you can advance purchase tickets. Except at 9AM on a Tuesday in October it was already sold out. We’re past summer vacations and it’s a Tuesday. In October. Huh? Remember the Johnson Space Center? We see a pattern here.
Susan found Plan B, a River Boat tour. So we booked that. (It’s always good to have options.)
Susan had noticed the cars parked on the levee when we came into town. She said something like, “Hey look, there are cars on sand…wait is that a…levee? By the Arch?” Paul growled something about, “I’m dodging insane traffic on this infernal bridge & trying not to plunge to our deaths…and HEY!!! Is that the Arch? COOL.”
We parked on the levee that we saw the day before. And them good ol’ boys weren’t drinkin’ whiskey and rye. And the levee didn’t break. Did we mention the levee was not flat? Almost 9 degrees of tilt. For the off road crowd, 9 degrees is nothing, we’re probably yawning, looking for the real challenge, but for everybody else? That 9 degrees of sideways tilt is a lot and you’re hanging on wondering if you’ll roll into the Mississippi.
Doubt that it’s steep? Go out into your drive, put the floor jack under the side of the car, and have a neighborhood kid crank it up to 9º. Go ahead, we’ll wait.
This is 9º baby. 9° with cobblestones made of granite in a very uneven surface. Side note, it took 7 years to build that levee. The workers were paid a penny per cobble and had to lay 40-50 per day to keep their job. They had to pay for lunch and dinner, working 6 days a week. They weren’t getting rich laying that levee down, bringing home $2.10/week.
And to be honest, that looks worse than it was. It is Susan’s photo and she’s really good with horizon lines, but I made the bridge in the background flat. So yeah, park on that. Oh yeah, drive over a chain that has 6″ links to keep the boats from floating away. Drive on that.
Oh, they have floods, big freaking scary floods.
That’s the 1947 Flood line. Even Tall Paul couldn’t breathe in that one. And we climbed a huge flight of stairs from the Jeep to get here!
We had sandwiches. We had no idea what food would be available. They had Shish Kabob, Fried Dough and Fresh Squeezed Lemonade. All closed. Nobody is here but the tram is sold out? Humph…
We went on the both ride. Our boat was called the Tom Sawyer and the boat we left in port is called the Becky Thatcher. That should have been our first clue that this was one of those not so great tourist traps.
It was hot. Worse than hot. Surface of the sun hot. We got to see bridges and industrial sites and homeless camps the tour guide glossed over (well, technically forgot to mention or used their secret super powers of distraction, “Oh, and on the other bank we have [next distraction].) Cities are not that good looking from boat rides particularly from rivers that have walls and levees lining the sides. It was hardly the romanticized notion of Tom Sawyer on the Mighty Mississippi.
Oh look the paddle wheel of the boat!
Except, when you watch the paddle wheels it’s pretty obvious they are not moving the boat. It is all a sham. We both agreed that the St. Louis Paddle Boat tours are best avoided. At least it wasn’t too expensive.
Now onto the Gateway Arch National Park, at only 91 acres it the smallest national park. We couldn’t get tickets for the tram to the top but we still wanted to see the museum. In the lobby we saw a model of the tram car. We figured we’d try it out in case we ever got back to St. Louis we’d buy advice tickets. It’s small. Think sardines. You cram yourself and a four others into this tin can enclosed tram (with the possibility that someone is carrying flu/RSV/COVID) to be winched to the top. Once there you get a whopping 10 minutes at the top. Cram yourself back into the tram to be winched back to ground level. Paul wants to take the tram up. Susan is not a fan. We both agree that Paul can wave to Susan from the top while she considers her poor life choice.
The underground museum exceed expectations! There was a lot of history of how the Gateway Arch was established. Paul even learned things about the Louisiana Purchase that he didn’t get in grade school. They didn’t gloss over the First Nations (Native Americans) genocide. They acknowledged the horror that it was. About 1/6 of the exhibit was about this dark time in our country’s history.
We could have spent hours here and we will come back.
But let’s take a goofy picture under the Arch!
But seriously, and not so seriously, our country’s past has some truly horrific moments, and some it has some inspiring moments. And that’s why we need to study history.
But enough of history. Let’s talk about chess! St. Louis is the home of the World Chess Hall of Fame. Hall of fame you say? We know, you’re all envious of the fancy lifestyle of the slow and curious. The St. Louis Chess Club which is located across the street from World Chess Hall of Fame collaborates on various projects and exhibits at the WCHF. Paul thought this adventure was fab. Susan was patient.
Paul had hoped to play some gnarly old chess hustler but they weren’t there. We did get to get see the world’s largest chess piece and tour the Hall of Fame. The first floor was about the “Sounds of Chess” which sounds really lame—until you walked through the exhibit and learned that a lot of very famous musicians play chess. People like David Bowie, Ray Charles, Robert Plant (whose favorite chess spot is in NYC) and so many more play/played chess. We can’t even remember all the musicians mentioned on the first floor. There was a Katy Perry exhibit from the Super Bowl featuring the actual costumes from her halftime show. Interestingly, the costumes looked tacky up close. For the Super Bowl footage they looked awesome.
Second floor was about T.S. Eliot, a famous St. Louis poet (“The Wastelands”) who seemed to have a passing association with chess. This setup was based on an Eliot piece which described a chess game. All of the antiques are from the St. Louis community. Paul visited the 2nd floor and was unimpressed.
We stopped at Letty Lous for an early dinner, that’s ok. We both were hungry. Paul tried the Fish and Chips made from catfish, not cod and it was very good. Susan had the fried chicken which was better than Gus’ Famous in Memphis. Portions were huge and Paul finished off the chicken for lunch the next day.
We did a lot of blogging that evening and headed off to bed.
Daily: 0
Total: 1163
Moving Miles/Day: 385
Overall Miles/Day: 233