looking up

on the road again.......


good morning from st. louis! my first and prevailing knowledge of st. louis is, it is HOT here. this moning marks the beginning of day three of the journey. typing backwards is going to prove challenging for me. my days are already turning into days......not good, fifteen more to go!

at the moment i can not remember how to link images to my blog....but i have added the last 2 day into my link over there on the left, i think, judith fender photography. ***please note, i have not had time to edit the images yet. color may look poor compared to what it really is****

day 1

there you can see we have been to mammoth cave, ky. the world's longest cave system....pretty cool, literally. an ambient temperature of 54 yearly...nice.

day 2
get-up and drive for 6 hours to st. louis only to be welcomed with stifling heat and humidity. ( i know i harp on temperatures...i don't care for heat unless it has an ocean breeze associated with it!) so, it's really hot here and we drive in and see the arches on the way in...awesome. if you check my images you will see a camper in a few of them, that is kirk and laura in front of us with the arches in the distant city view.

we land at our campground and poor don suffered through setting-up the camper in the heat....we turned around and headed right back to the arches. amazing site to see. unreal. we had a tour scheduled, and after a heavy security patdown, we were in! let me just say that i did not read ahead about the arches...so, i did know we were riding in a tram to the top, to look out then back down. what i did not know is that the doors would open and we we would have to get OUT of the said "pod" and walk on the top of the arches to see out the tiny peep holes to the city....the look on my face when the doors opened and the asian man, eager to get in our pod, was motioning with much emotion for me to "get the hell out of this car, i want off this arch, NOW!" with my jaw wide open i shockingly crawled out onto the ramp. yea...there i was with my babies 630 some feet in the air....unreal to think that there was nothing directly below me except air.
we took the needed photos and i was ready to go. while waiting in line for my pod to return me to earth, when the doors opened, i was able to compose myself a bit more tactfully than the asian man i had encountered earlier.

the evening faded into dinner time. the old spaghetti factory is where we had dinner. for me, it was a welcome reprieve from the heat. the building was an old hotel...very old and very cool.

we did see some flooded streets and the ferry ride was closed. if you look in my images you will see a picture from the top, of the arch shadows. from that image you can see bits of the dock under the muddy mississippi river.

day three
we have decided to let the kids and kirk sleep in, (just kidding kirk!) and don, larry and myself are almost having a brezzy morning. we are located beside a river, don't know which one, and a railroad track and large bridge.....not much to view. there was also a police car with flashing lights last night across the chain link fence... the campground is clean....but in an area like our river area in asheville. junk and rusty cars.....we leave soon. larry just shared the weather news with us....100 degree heat index today....pray for me.

key word to remember to discuss;
zepher 7, beetle butt, cheecky man, fuzzy face.....

J