Lewis and Clark Confluence Tower

Found another Cake!  Yay us!

Had another Groupon that was going to go to waste if I didn't use it.  Plus I got four souvenir bags with it free.  I need more bags.  I don't leave the ones I have enough in the car when going into the store:/                                                                                                                                   The Lewis and Clark Confluence tower was only about 30 minutes away so we hit two attractions in one day!  It's really a simple tour.  They take you up and you look at the two rivers converging.  It was worth the four bucks and has a nice little interpretive trail around the center.

The tower has three levels.  They didn't take us on the 50 foot level  because she said all we would see would be the levee.  I think it was more.. I want to get you people out of here because it's almost time for me to go home.   It would have been nice to have the option to see a wall of dirt but we did come at the end of the day sooo....                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      The 100 foot platform had all sorts of information about the rivers  and gave a panoramic view of not only the river but the water tower at SIUE and Pierre Marquette State Park as well as the refineries and packing plants that helped finish building and staffing the tower.  

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               

The most interesting part for me though was when she pointed out the monument in the river.  See that black speck in front of the trees where the two rivers meet?  That'd be a monument.  You can walk out there and put one foot in the Mississippi and one in the Missouri!  How cool is that?  Why yes.... I do believe I'll do that next weekend:0)

The guide then explained why there are two colors here.  We always think of the Muddy Mississippi.  Well....turns out  the Missouri is a much swifter river so it carries more silt.  The dark part of the river is the MISSOURI river.. The lighter is the Mississippi.  Interesting.... very interesting.. and that's pretty much it for the tour.  You go up .. you come down.  It's 4 bucks a person which isn't horrible and it's worth the view.  Make sure you go on a warm calm day because the higher you go the more wicked that wind blows!  
Until next time:)

Cahokia Mounds

I've been lax in blogging for a while.  My feet have wanderlust!  I have been wanting to travel... go somewhere new!   I realized I had a Groupon that I had not taken care of and it was about to expire so we decided it was a beautiful day to go exploring.  Mom, Tommy and I had never been and we've lived in the St. Louis area FOREVER!

Along the way we decided to go cake hunting too! 2014 is the 250th celebration of St. Louis' founding.  The city has placed cakes decorated by local artists all around the city and suburbs.  Cahokia is in IL but it's close enough to be considered a suburb.  You can read more about the Cakeway to the West here.

Our first visit was to Cahokia Mounds.

We went to the Interpretive Center and started to view the museum with our self directed i pods -- really nice presentation!  Worth the price of renting them.  Then they called for the short introductory film that is displayed.  I should mention here that the Interpretive Center and the Mounds themselves are FREE.  Free I say!  Free admission to everything.  You pay for the use of the i pods but that's about it.  I digress... 

The movie was called Cahokia - The City of the Sun.  I already learned  more than  when I had arrived considering I thought they were all burial mounds.  Turns out they aren't.  There are flat mounds that had buildings upon them and rounded mounds that were in fact burial mounds.  There is much speculation as to what the buildings were and why there were mounds for houses.  I found that very interesting and of course started to speculate.  I honestly think that some of it was because of flooding.. wouldn't you keep your top people, burial sites (think New Orleans!) and food stuffs (Did you know that they could store corn for up to three years?) up out of the way of floods?.  My personal thoughts with nothing other than common sense to back it up:) -- I read a book while I waited for the pictures to upload... flooding was a concern:) 

Monk's Mound

We decided to do the outdoor part of the tour after the movie.. The first stop was a mound called, "Monk's Mound".  It was named after a French trapper who came along after the Indians were gone and resided on a nearby mound and gardened on Monk's Mound.  It has four terraces.  It is 100 feet in the air and a thousand feet long.  The mound it self covers 14,000 square feet. It is the LARGEST prehistoric earthen structure in the Americas.  Who knew?  Right in our own background!  I am assuming  that the measurement is horizontal and vertical.  100 feet doesn't sound like a huge amount until you consider that they had to carry the dirt from "borrow" pits on their backs - 40 to 50 pounds at a time.  The mounds were 100's of years in the making.  The other striking feature is how they resemble the Egyptian Pyramids. In fact it's often called a truncated pyramid.  Scholars aren't real sure why.  Speculations run from the thought that the plans were handed down from mouth to mouth and maybe they are connected by a common religion or they also suspect it was just a good solid way to build.  After all... houses still have four walls right?

Tommy at the top of Monk's Mound

From a distance, Monk's Mound just looks like a flat topped (truncated) hill and doesn't really appear that tall so I am glad they planted trees for some perspective.  They have steps leading up to the first and third tiers.  They are modern stairs complete with hand rails.  At the time of the Cahokia civilization, they stairs were in the same place but were rough logs put in place as stairs.  This mound is the largest mound in the vicinity and had ceremonial buildings in place.

 They believe that a temple or a palace was on top and smaller structures and additional mounds were built on the lower tiers.  I have to confess.. the first tier...looks like grass:) The interesting thing about these mounds were the core samples.  Different types of dirt were used in different areas to  make sure the structure was secure and had adequate drainage.  That is an amazing feat when you consider this was all done by hand over a period of 300 years. At any rate... nothing remains of the buildings on top of the mounds.  It's really a few concrete signs and a wonderful view of the other mounds.  This is where the I pod comes in handy.  The signs themselves are just markers of which mound has which number.  The I pod talks about the individual mounds and what they discovered when excavating.  One mound in particular was found to have many many bodies buried in it.  Some very carefully, some thrown in a mass grave with no care and some were placed with arms interlocking and their heads and hands cut off.  I'm morbid I admit it.. I'd love to know what that was all about!  There also is evidence that family members were slain to accompany their family members into the after world.   Doesn't that sound Egyptian too?

Twin mounds.. the one straight ahead is Fox Mound

 
At any rate, I thought this would just be a little place with a few mounds here and there.  I had mom and Tommy with me, neither of whom, appreciate a 10 mile hike so I'll return another day to do that and explore more mounds:)  The photo to the left shows twin mounds.  The one straight ahead is truncated and they believe that it may have been  place to prepare bodies for burials which were then placed in the round top mounds.  They called these huts charnel houses and sometimes they were burned as part of the burial but sometimes they were just used as preparation places. 



They also had something called a stockade.  It was a large wall made of logs built around the town proper.  In the renditions of the museum, it looked very much like the walls of the first forts in the area.  Weird huh?

At the height of it's civilization, The Mississippians had close to 20,000 people living near on in the vicinity of the mounds.  They were no long hunters and gathers.  They were able to farm maize and live off the land.  This allowed for society to become...society.  Certain members assured of a ration of the food could now specialize in weapons, pottery, clothing (side note.. they used brains to soften or tan the leather for clothing... blech!)etc.  Trade formed because of this idleness (meaning they didn't have to always hunt for food) .  Scholars found sea shells and copper and this led them to discover that not only were the people bartering with each other but they were bartering with people of different tribes and nations.   I only bring this up because it seems that this may have been their blessing and their downfall.   As the population boomed.. resources depleted.  Malnutrition and a variety of diseases occurred.  Constant fires caused smog.  I really found the parallels to modern day life striking... 

St. Louis Skyline from Monk's Mound

St.  Louis has been known as Mound City... Evidently there were many mounds on what is currently downtown St. Louis.  Makes sense I guess... It's really not that far away.

Down the road from Monk's Mound is the American Woodhenge.  Not to be confused with England's Stone Henge.  Woodhenge is a circle of cedars positioned much like a sundial.  It's believed that the Natives used it to show important dates, primarily the winter and summer solstices which they used for planting purposes. 

In the above Woodhenge pictures, the poles marked are the Summer and Winter Soltice poles.  There is a pole in the middle that acts much like a sundial, pointing to specific poles depending upon the angle of the sun. 

After our trek to see Monk's Mound and Woodhenge, we went back and toured the museum.  I didn't really use the I pod much here as I pretty much could read what I wanted to know.  They have some really interesting exhibits!   

Birdman

The statue below depicts a man playing Chunkey. The rocks surrounding him were the "balls".  I gotta wonder who came up with the name here.  Basically you rolled the rock or stone and then threw a spear to see who would get closest to where it was going to land.  They would have all day events and betting.  Ah, civilization:)

Think I've gabbered on too much here.  It was really interesting and I could have spent all day there but decided to take pity on my poor mother and brother.  My Groupon came with two free books.... I read one already.  Its about 70 pages long and called The City of the Sun. It's a pretty good read.  The other is called Journey to Cahokia An Educational Activity Book --- Now how'd they know I was a teacher?  It even says in the book to copy the activity pages!  Me Likee! 

Of course,  I bought two more books as well.  I'll let you know how they are!  One is a fiction book called Fishbone the Potter. It's book one in a series called the Cahokia Mounds Duelogy.  The other is called Spirits of the Earth A Guide to Native American Nature Symbols, Stories and Ceremonies. Can't wait to get started on them!  

Until next time! 

P.S. I almost forgot... Found a cake! :)

New Orleans Arrival

Better late than never!  We got to New Orleans on Saturday afternoon and checked into the Maison St. Charles which is located in the Garden District.  The hotel was interesting to say the least. To get to the actual hotel rooms you appear to drive into the hotel itself.  We were all a bit trepidatious about this but the sign said Enter so we entered!

Maison St. Charles Hotel

When we drove in, the hotel actually had a covered courtyard complete with murals on the walls.  It was beautiful! 

Statue in covered courtyard.

Mural in the drive through courtyard

Other side of drive through courtyard

Painted on the building next to our room.

After we drove through and checked in the first thing we saw was a black cat.   I had to wonder if that was a good sign or a bad sign.  The kitty was really very friendly and as we had a vet with us, I couldn't muse too much about it. 

The courtyard outside our room was in full wedding mode !  People were dancing, drinking and having a great time.  It was a beautiful venue for a wedding!   Soon after we went in the room, we noticed people circling the courtyard and swinging handkerchiefs as they followed the happy couple.  I was really wondering what in the world that was all about.  Turns out that it is a New Orleans tradition called a second line. Traditionally, this occurred after a jazz band.  The jazz band went first and then the second liners came dancing and enjoying the music.  It was also used at Funerals where everyone followed the hearse or coffin and sang dirges or hymns.  I much prefer the wedding version.  Traditionally, the wedding occurs close enough for people to follow the wedding party to the reception and they sing and rejoice in the couples' happiness along the way.  Parasols and handkerchiefs are often twirled and that is what we saw.  It looked so fun! 

Interior hotel room.

New Orleans Box! 

We started to unpack and make the room more festive with some surprises I had packed for the girls!  Boas and mini bottles:)  

Festive lamps.. Now! 

After we unpacked, Stephanie and I started our touring!  Tera and Julie stayed behind to rest.  Poor Tera drove the whole way so I can only imagine how tired she was AND she was coming down with a cold and didn't know it.  Julie's back didn't survive the car trip very well so she needed rest as well.  Stephanie and I, however were raring to go!   We walked out of the hotel and immediately noticed the trees that still had the Mardi Gras beads from the previous weekend on them.  The pictures below are a little out of order but honestly it's late and I'm tired.  :)  We were looking for Lafayette Cemetary Number one but we fell woefully short of it.   As it got dark we wandered back to the hotel room.  As you can see from the pictures it really is the Garden District! 

Houses  still with Mardi Gras Decorations

Love this house and tree

Houses

Beads in trees

Houses

Random Fountain

Birth of a Muse.. She got beads:)

Me obsessing over the cool tree

courtyard of the building next to us.  

Room decorations

Black Cat welcoming us.

Trees whose branches grown in and out of the ground.

More historic houses. sooo beautiful!

Beads all over the trees

Pretty houses on Prytania Street or thereabouts.

Love the house!

 Later that night, we ventured out to Bourbon Street of course.  It was the weekend after Mardi Gras but it was still wild!  More about that on the next post!

Batesville, MS

Stopped for the night at Batesville, Ms.  Gotta say that the place we stayed was amazing.  We brought everything but the kitchen sink and still managed to forget toothbrushes.  The main desk provided them at no cost along with toothpaste.  It was very reasonable and a VERY nice hotel!

Onward we went the next morning to NOLA!  Excitement Reigns!

We stopped somewhere-- couldn't tell you where and I immediately had a random book reference.  We were at a restaurant and I looked across and there was a Winn Dixie.  I immediately thought of the great children't book, Because of Winn-Dixie by Kate Dicamillo.  If you ever get a chance to read it, I highly recommend it!

Mississippi

Not much to report thus far. Lots of driving and jamming out with tunes. Hampton Inn in Batesville, Ms was fairly inexpensive and was a great hotel!!  Love the feel it the sun and the warmer weather!  Whoo hoo!  

29 degrees at home and 63 here. Can't wait to break out the flip flops!!  Three and a half hours until New Orleans!

Trolley Tour of St. Louis!

It's true!

It occurs to me that while I blog when I go to new and interesting places, I never really think of the new and interesting stuff here in St. Louis.  My friend Darla arranged for us to go on a Trolley Tour of St. Louis.  At first I was thinking... what are we gonna see that I haven't been in but it was a good call.  Kudos to you Darla.  Learned a LOT of history that I didn't know and got to hang out with some way cool folks while doing it!

Way cool people:)

The old power plant!

I got there a little early and was able to snap a picture of the power plant.  I am obsessed with old buildings.  In Memphis and New Orleans I sighed over all the fancy buildings.  But when you are home you tend to not see the forest for the trees.  The building was beautiful if a bit dirty.  Then you turn around and see the new architecture that is beautiful in its own way as well.  The old and the new united in good ole' St. Louie!

Lumiere Casino and hotel

Outside the Lumiere Casino is the pick up location.  I was confused as I thought that all Casinos in Missouri had to be on boats.  Turns out that there was a boat on pillions on the Mississippi River.  The Mississippi River is not nicknamed the Mighty Mississippi for nothing.  The boat got loose and floated on down the river with gamblers on it!  Yikes.  You can read about it here if you want. Anywho.. there was lots of damage and although there were no deaths, the casino people felt that they might be better off in a more secure location.  They built a big beautiful casino well above flood stage.  They added floaters so it counts as a boat and actually pump water up the hill to support the building in about 8 inches of river water.  It's a boat.  It's on the river water and there's no chance it will break away.  Pretty tricky huh?

Money is the root of all evil they say.  Is it weird that the address is 999 n. 2nd street?  I mean if you look at the 9's upside down.. just saying..

Anyhow, that's where the Trolley started.  We used Fun Tours St. Louis and we rode in Charlotte the Trolley.  Our conductor, driver .. what DO you call a Trolley worker?  Well at any rate, his name was Dennis.  He was hysterical.  His catch phrase was ABSOLUTELY FREE.  We have a heck of a lot of free stuff here in St. Louis!  

We went by the Edward Jones dome and of course I couldn't snap a decent picture.   We'll see if the Rams stay and play there or if they do indeed revert to the Los Angeles Rams.  I, for one, could care less but that's the hub bub in the Lou bub:)

Then we headed for Forest Park.  On our way there we passed Ronnoco coffee plant.  I always thought it was a strange name but it's facinating how it got it's name.  Turns out two Irish brothers established the business in a primarily Italian town.  In order to make a go of it they needed an Italian sounding name but still wanted to leave some of themselves in the business.  A light bulb went off and they decided to still use their name for the company only spelling it backwards.   Smart Fellas!

As we got ready to turn in Dennis talked to us about Barnes Jewish Hospital and how that was where the first lung transplant was completed.  Had no IDEAR!

World's Fair Pavilion

 I found out a lot of stuff about Forest Park that I didn't know.  I had no idea it was larger than Central Park in New York.  Of course I knew about the 1904 World's Fair and that the bird cage at the zoo was made then and was the impetus for the current top 10 in the nation zoo, which is ABSOLUTELY FREE:0)  We passed the World's Fair Pavilion which was built three years after the World's Fair.  On the terraces were the governments of the different participating countries with the U.S at the top.

James S. McDonnel Planetarium

We passed the Science Center Planetarium.  The other half is across the highway and is ABSOLUTELY FREE!  During the Christmas season there is a bright red bow tied around it.  In 1963 or 64 some college kids decided to play a prank by tying a ribbon around it.  St. Louisianians liked it so much that the ribbon appears every year now!

While we were going through the park, Dennis told us the story of the carousel. It was the largest ever.  It was about half the size of the Arch and each car could hold about 60 people.  Electricity was just coming into use and many brides decided to be married on the carousel. They eventually put a piano in one of the cars for just such an occasion.  One couple got married on the carousel on horseback.  Makes me wonder what he horses thought!

St Louis Art Museum

We stopped at the Art Museum and got out.  Incidentally the Art Museum is ABSOLUTELY FREE!   There was a neat cake out in front.  Guess what? In 2014 St. Louis is 250 years old.  Turns out they are doing an event called the Cakeway to the West.  For those of you not in the area, St. Louis is knows as the Gateway to the West so it's a play on words.  At any rate, there are cakes positioned randomly around St. Louis to celebrate the birthday.  Anyone want to do a cake walk/drive?

We stretched our legs and took some photos.  I always wondered why  there was a man on horseback

King Louis Patron of the Arts.

in front of the museum.  Turns out it was King Louis (and some number... think he said 14th) .  He was King of France at a very young age so his mom ruled until he came of age.  Guess what he studied?  He was known as a benevolent King to the arts.  So he stands on horseback in front of the St. Louis Art Museum.  A little old history.. and then.. a little new.  Next to the Art Museum is a silver/titanium tree.  It's just really cool and kind of odd as it just sits out by itself with not sculpture around it.  I'm wondering how many times lightening has struck it because if you don't like the weather here.. just wait five minutes!   King Louis looks over the landmark of Art Hill.   Art Hill is known in the area for good sledding.  It's steep enough to go fairly fast yet not to fast.  It's an easy walk back up and there is the added danger of falling in the lake.  If you look closely you will notice hay bales.  I think someone in management finally got a clue although two of them still did end up on the ice.

Happy Birthday St. Louis!

Next we made our way back downtown by way of Millonaires Row.  I love these houses and I will never own one. LOL.  I took some pics of my favorites and then one was pointed out with their own Art Museum attached. I think there should be a law that if you have a museum attached to your house, people are allowed to come and see what your house looks like on the inside because I am so curious now!

One of the houses on Millonaires Row was were Vincent Price grew up!   Didn't even know he was from St. Louis! 

Love this one!  Very Unique! 

Vincent Price lived in one of these !

Show of hands.  Who wants to see what's in this museum?

University City City Hall

Next we went down on the Loop.  The Delmar Loop to be exact.  It has it own walk of fame.  Chuck Berry still performs here once a month!  I loved the city hall building.  This neighborhood has an eclectic vibe.  Lots of mom and pop shops.  You won't find a chain restaurant here but will find many strange characters roaming around the streets.  You also will find avant garde clothes and music on almost every corner.




 

Moon rise hotel.  Love the old time moon on the top!

Fitz's Rootbeer..mmmmmm

On our way back to the Casino to disembark we passed the new Bascilica .  St. Louis has two and old and a new.  This is the new one and tours are give ABSOLUTELY FREE.  I haven't been inside yet so this is definitely on my to do list!
Pretty pretty pretty church!

\

I think I'm out of order now but it doesn't really matter.  This is the old Capital building which was the first building to have a copper dome!  It was where the Dred Scott case was tried.  For sixteen years they wrestled with the decision of whether a slave could appeal for his freedom.  Ultimately it was decided that slaves did not have the right to sue as they were not citizens but instead property.  There is a statue honoring him in front of the Court House.

Eads bridge built 1874.

We next went to the Eads bridge.  This was probably the most interesting place for me.  The Eads was the longest Cantilever Bridge in the world.  After it was completed people were suspicious that it would hold and refused to use it.  Eads sent 14 locomotives across it and still people refused to use it.  He then found an elephant and led it across the bridge.  People were more willing to trust the elephant as they believed they had a sixth sense about things like this!




Somewhere on the tour we passed the old garment district where more hats were made than anywhere else in the country.  I didn't even realize we had a garment district in St. Louis.  I'd been down this street before and wondered why they left these funny looking rough spots on the road.  Turns out it's a zipper going down the road representing the garment district.  It's the little things that make you go hmmmmm......

Close up of zipper teeth

Now that I know it's a zipper I can actually make it out!

After we finished with the Trolley we went to Hannigans at Laclede's landing .  GOOOOD Food!  Goood People ...Goooood day! 

Everyone at Hannigans!

One last photo before I go.  A day in the Lou is not complete without a photo of the Gateway Arch! You can go in both sides AND it's ABSOLUTELY FREE to go through the museum.  You have to pay a fee to go up in the arch.  It's worth the view though!