Travel Forum / Travel Types / RV Travel / July 2004

Tuesday July 20, 2004 Casino Queen RV-Park Bogy Ave, east St Louis,
Illinois:          N38° 37.570': W90° 10.120' $24.00 for full
hookup/50amps & cable no water but central dump.  Telephone at site
was $3 per-night extra.  This place has LOCATION!  Walk across bridge
to arch.  Arch is visible out our window across the river.  LOCATION!

This was our day to do the ARCH.  It was an all day thing.  Following
someone's advice (I think it was Dave & Helen from Golden, Colorado)
we walked across the river from the RV-Park on the historic Eads
Bridge constructed in the 1874.  It is still a fine looking bridge.  I
am amazed.  This bridge was under construction during the Civil War
years but not finished until later. The walk across the bridge was
awesome.  You really get to see the city and a spectacular view down
the Mississippi River.

It really is a small world.  That point was brought home to us today
when it was pointed out that the "Casino Queen" gambling boat was made
in Pensacola where we are from.  The Casino Queen's RV-Park is where
we are staying.  We remember that boat being constructed by Patti Ship
Yard in Pensacola.  Near the end of construction the people who
ordered the boat had financial problems and the completed boat became
the banks property.  It sat in Pensacola for several years before
these people purchased it.  It was BIG news when it left its mooring
spot up in a small bayou.  That behemoth squeezed through a drawbridge
with just inches on either side.  The pictures of it squeezing through
the old Bayou Chico draw bridge are hanging in Joe Patti's fish market
on the waterfront near downtown Pensacola.  If I am not mistaken (and
I could be) it was a $1,000,000 check from the construction of this
boat that was placed in Mr. Patti's desk drawer and "forgotten".  If
you are from Pensacola you will remember that story.

At the Arch we did everything that costs money.  We still have several
"free" things to do another day.  We went up in the ARCH, we watched
the IMAX film of Lewis & Clark's expedition, we watched a documentary
film about the construction of the ARCH and finally we took a
riverboat cruise up and down the Mississippi River.  We also spent
several hours in the Museum of Western Expansion housed in the base of
the ARCH.  All of these are "must do" items when visiting St Louis.

Someone could and has written volumes about the ARCH.  I won't do
that; suffice it to say if you are ever in St Louis you have to do the
ARCH.  I think I have seen a documentary on the Discovery Channel
about the construction of the ARCH.  Documentary films about the Lewis
& Clark expedition will probably be played several times on the
History or Discovery Channel this year.  That is why I am not going to
spend any more time describing these things.

The walk back across the Eads Bridge seemed to be much farther than
the walk over.  That phenomenon might have been because it was at the
end of a long day.
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Mike & Joyce Hendrix
Remove nospam from e-mail address to make it work.
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Mike Hendrix
Pensacola
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