June 18, 2013: Bowling Green, MO to Hannibal, MO

Cool, dry and a crystal blue sky this Golf Day!

  A short drive north on The River Road, with some neat rural scenes and an occasional glimpse of the broad Mississippi, we arrived in Hannibal, boyhood home of Mark Twain.

 

 

 

We had visited here a few years ago and it was fun to drive around the small historic district and reminisce. 

After driving twenty minutes on dirt roads, we arrived at the public golf course, which looked surprisingly nice considering we were in the backwoods somewhere, only our GPS knew where..
The greens were in great condition, but the first nine holes were fairly new and a bit boring.  The back nine was older and had lots of trees (unfortunately for a few of Jack's drives) and personality. 

Have you noticed yet that I have not mentioned how we scored?  Unfortunately, the humidity began to build and by the time we finished at 3pm, thunderstorms were threatening.  Right during my backswing on #16, a series of three huge booms exploded.  At first, I thought it was the beginning of big thunderclap, but it was a lot louder and deeper.  When we returned to the clubhouse, Jack found it had been a sonic boom and its accompanying echoes, made by a jet. 

We stayed in a nice state park with a campsite on a small lake a half hour north of Hannibal in a small town called La Grange.  It is a pretty spot with cottonwood puffs drifting about and mama and papa geese strutting about with their little ones in tow. 

Score?  What score?

June 17, 2013 Pere Marquette State Park, IL to Granite City, IL to Bowling Green, MO

Yesterday, we drove through a gorgeous stretch of Mississippi riverfront, but did not stop at any of the small towns for photos because we wanted to get to the campground early enough to watch the Open.  Today, we returned south along The River to do some exploring.  Before we left Pere Marquette State Park, though, we drove a narrow scenic road in the Park to a number of lookouts on the top of the ridge.  Unfortunately, these viewpoints are only scenic in winter when the leaves are off the trees.  This is prime winter eagle viewing territory, so the overlooks are for bird-watching.  I did get one photo of the flooded, muddy river in the distance.

We stopped in the small town of Grafton with lots of restaurants, bars and a marina for the St. Louis weekend crowd, but it was deserted on this Monday morning, except for flood clean-up crews.

 

We could see high water marks on the sides of buildings and their road next to the river was gone. 

End of the road

Their entire ballfield was under water and a house sat in the middle of the river, with no way to get to it except by boat.  

 
 

The homes that did escape damage we on the tallest stilts I have ever seen.

 

 A little further south we came upon the quaint village of Elsah that was a real step back in time. This hamlet had been mostly cut off from the world until 1965 when the River Road was built. Beautiful stone cottages with amazing gardens, picture perfect churches and an old time school.

 

 

We continued southeast along the river near St. Louis to check out the Lewis and Clark historical site. It had a short film and exhibits about the team wintering here preparing for their amazing journey to the Pacific. 

Although they have an area where you can view the confluence of the Mighty Mississippi and the Missouri rivers, it was flooded, so we went a 1/2 mile up the road to the Confluence Tower. The tower gives a bird's eye view of the confluence as well as the incredible flooding. Friday night trivia buffs, listen up: The Missouri is longer than the Mississippi, runs faster and carries more silt. We were told that you can still see the Missouri waters more than a mile downstream from the confluence because of the different color due to the higher silt content.

 

 

 



The water to the first tree line is all flooded farm fields.  the Mississippi is on the right between the trees, while the Missouri is coming from the far right.

Confluence of Mississippi and Missouri



View from the top at the parking lot with our RV

We drove west on the interstate around St. Louis and stopped at a rest area to have some lunch.  We saw this is the dog walking area... !



His pooper scooper was a big bucket!

We drove north to Bowling Green, Missouri to a campground with guaranteed good internet service. Yeah!

While watching the news, we found that we must have been under a silver-lined cloud because much of the St. Louis area experienced drenching rains, flash floods and a lot of street flooding, but somehow all we saw was a little drizzle.  Planning a tourist day off tomorrow to play some golf in Hannibal,Missouri, home of Mark Twain.

June 15, 2013 Cape Giardeau North on the Great River Road to Baldwin, Illinois

After leaving the campground, we drove north to the Trail of Tears State Park on the Missouri side of the Mississippi River.  The park has a wonderful visitor center documenting the "Great American Shame" of forcibly relocating 16,000 Cherokee Indians from the lush farming valleys and good hunting grounds of North Carolina, Tennessee and Georgia to the arid lands of Oklahoma.  Andrew Jackson was responsible for the policy that relocated all Native Americans to the western Indian Territories from east of the Mississippi to increase the land available to white men.  The removal took place over the winter and between 4,000 and 5,000 people died of cold and disease. This was one one of several routes that relocated Seminole from Florida, Creek and Chickasaw from Alabama, and Choctaw from Mississippi.

I walked a shady trail in the State Park through the woods one mile to a lookout on a bluff overlooking the Mississippi River.  A warm, humid day made for hazy views, but it was still a spectacular look at the still flooded muddy river with a massive barge plowing upstream.

Looking south

Northbound barge



Unhealthy-looking turtle I encountered on the trail..

We backtracked south to Cape Giardeau to cross The River back to Illinois to follow The Great River Road north through Illinois.  Although marked as scenic on my map, there was not much to see other than cornfields, which are common everywhere in rural Illinois.  The last town designated in the scenic route was the village of Chester.  In the center of town was a little park celebrating Chester as the home of Popeye, born to author Elzie Segar in his daily comic strip, Thimble Theatre.  OK, Friday night trivia aficionados, we now have this critical information for any future Popeye-related questions.

 

 

 

 

Trivia Question-whose last name was Opdyke?

 

 

After a short photo session, we walked across the street for an ice cream cone and met a 60 plus year old man bicycling from Virginia to Oregon!  His wife was accompanying him in an RV and they meet up every couple of days.  Chester was his planned stop for the night and he was calling the police to ask if he could sleep in the park.  Wow!

 

We continued north to a little farm hamlet for a campground with full hookups behind a small, but well-kept motel.  The campground had room for about 40 RVs, but we were the only ones there.  We theorized that the place is for seasonal farm workers - why else so much space in an area where there are no tourist or scenic attractions?  Another hot and humid night and we are thankful to have air conditioning, but it is noisy and are looking forward to some cooler nights.