Day 4 - The tallest thing I've ever seen! St. Louis

Monday, July 20, 2009

This morning we had to get an early start. We had a 9:00 reservation at The Arch. At breakfast we met local hostess and Baptist preacher, Ruth Booker. She was extremely nice and blessed me. I would trade her in for my sisters, especially after four days of driving. She gave me a great big hug when we left.

From the hotel we walked 7 blocks until we arrived at The Arch. "It was the tallest thing I've ever seen!!" No one in my family had ever seen this monument. We were all thrilled. Mom and Lea couldn't stop taking photos.

To get to the top of the monument we went into a really small elevator that had 5 seats. It reminded me of the Willy Wonka Space Capsule. We pretended I was Charlie and we were about to break through the glass ceiling.

Chris & the girls inside the "Willy Wonka capsule"

The ride up is 4 minutes and the ride down is 3 minutes. The Arch is 630 feet tall. There are 32 small windows that you can look through. On one side you can see the Mississippi river and the other side is the city. The people on the street looked like peanut crumbs.

Looking out the small windows at the top of the Arch

When we returned to the ground, we visited the Lewis & Clark Museum. This told the story of the westward expansion during the early 1800s. It had a lot of beautiful pictures. Lea remembered a lot about this expansion since she just finished studying it in 5th grade. Fact of the day - Did you know that Lewis & Clark sent care packages to the President that detailed their findings? These packages included skull/bones of animals that they had killed and eaten, skin of a yellow bear, and horns of two deer.

We left St. Louis at noon since we had a long drive to Oklahoma City. The drive started out pretty uneventful. We began to see billboards that made us laugh. Dad saw one for a "Vacuum Outlet Center" - how many vacuums does one family need? There was another one for the "Largest Rocking Chair in the World."

My sisters are a little annoying but I got through it as best as a 7 year old could. We spent a long time playing Barbies today. The driving hasn't been too bad. OK...Mom said that we promised Mrs.Gaglioti that we wouldn't "sugarcoat" any part of the trip. This was the first day that the driving got to my parents. After driving 5 hours through the rural Missouri and Oklahoma plains, the only thing you could see was cattle. Dinner had to be postponed since there was no eatery in sight and exits every 35 miles or so. In fact, Dad started singing all these crazy songs about being in Oklahoma and being on the range while listening to sickening country music. We know why the speed limit is 75 mph in this area - they want to spare you the pain and let you get through it as quickly as possible.

Tomorrow is going to be another LONG day of travel also after we visit the Oklahoma City memorial of the Federal building bombing.

Hope y'all like it!!!

Erin