Hopi spirit dolls, Pueblo Story Tellers, Cotton candy,
Taffy, Cowboy boots, 10 gallon hats, Cactus plants in mini pots and thousands
upon thousands of other items. Imagine if Roald Dahl and Taneleer Tivan got
together for a business venture: that is what Ozarkland is.
Ozarkland IS the Rabbit
Hole
We woke up in Kansas City nice and early and headed out to
St Louis along the I70. The scenery remains simple and relatively repetitive
which suits us well at this stage of the journey. Just great stretches of road,
some tree cover and flowing rivers. One thing that South Africans will find
amazing is the sheer volume of the rivers that flow through America. They are
huge. The way they classify a medium sized river there is larger than our Orange
River. By a long way. Really impressive
stuff.
Along the way we pulled over to see this “American Road Trip
Tradition” named Ozarkland. Holy moly it is a unique place. The amount of nik
naks and little trinkets is mind boggling. I am sure people must have lost
children in there before with the little dude coming out years looking like
Robin Williams in Jumanji.
From there it’s a short 100 mile trip to St Louis. After a
bit of searching around and, with the grace of HotWire , we managed to get a night’s
stay at the Hilton hotel. Fantastic location. From our window we could see the
old court house and the Gateway Arch. That’s the one from the Nelly music video
– Hot in Herre.
The hotel was hosting an Olympics preparation summit of some
kind (Rio Olympics round the corner) and so Barbara and I, in our mid holiday
fattiness glory, where surrounded by pristine and conditioned athletes. Felt so
odd. Felt like the fat kids on the playground.
St Louis Soul
St Louis was the first city that we came across that had its
own African American culture. You know, one that really stood out. It was the
first time on our sprint journey that we noticed the African Americans had
their own way of talking and walking. You could see the culture standing separate
from the others. It was a great feeling. The cultural diversity, the color diversity and the typically flamboyant story telling – it all felt like home.
Directly across the road from our hotel is the old Court House.
That is to be our first stop as they sell tickets for the Gateway Arch and the
River Boat ride there. The building from the outside is quite impressive. The
building from the side is something else entirely. The huge ten meter long
flag, the shiny wood surfaces and patriotic murals on the floor give you the sense
of distinct as you walk through the historic house. There are loads of little
rooms with bits and pieces of history laid out for you to take a wonder about.
Once again you feel that shout-out-for-no-reason American pride.
From there we headed down to the Mississippi River and the famous
Gateway Arch. I would never have thought the arch was built in 1963 as the
engineering and construction materials are just so impressive. It really is
astonishing. It looks like something Lt. Spock designed whilst being bombed on cocaine
and jizzing in his pants. The surface is impeccably shiny, the shape is
beautifully symmetrical and how on earth they managed to get the welding seams
so smooth and perfect is beyond me.
Inside the Arch, underneath its foundations, there is a fantastic
little museum and storytelling mural of how the Arch was built. Our flamboyant
and expressive tour guide gave us the run down whist flipping his hands and
dipping his hips for story telling effect. To get to the top you have to sit
inside this little crammed nut-shell type elevator that clicks and clonks its
way up a chain style stair case. At the top you have this narrow walled and
curved floored little room, about the size of a container cabin. In order to
see any of the view you have to perch yourself up onto the window ledge which
makes your poephol nip properly and makes you feel like the center of gravity
is about to shift to topple this alien structure to the ground. The view is fantastic.
Spelling MISSISSIPPI
as a kid
From there Barbara and I jumped onto the Tom Sawyer river
boat and had a great tour up stream. The boat takes a little over an hour but
the conductor gives you a history lesson of the bridges, past trades, power
stations, boat routes and how St Louis has had its ups and downs.
Top Tip #7: The Americans are
great that way. The security guards, boat operators, bus drivers and even the
store clerks from time to time will just blurt out some fanatic little history
lesson for you. The security guard at the court house was more of a curator than
anything else really. A very buff and hard core dressed curator. Use your tourist accent and ask questions - they love to answer them.
From there we headed back to our hotel, got freshened up and
went off back down stairs for a night out. I heard that the Budweiser brewery
has an outlet at the sports stadium next door. The brew house was great. They
had a big screen showing Any Given Sunday, the beers are well priced
(relatively) and the bites to eat where worth the money.
Just after sun down and we both fell by the way side. It had
been a pretty long day in the St Louis sunlight. We headed back upstairs and called
it a night.
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