Family Vacation 2009 Part 1---St. Louis

May 22-31, 2009---***Disclaimer: I took 710 photographs while on vacation and edited those down to 453. You will be subjected to only a "few" of them.***


We Crawfords love our yearly vacations and try to choose new and interesting places to go each year. After seeing "The Waterpark Capital of the World" mentioned on several Travel Channel shows we decided that this would be our choice for 2009. You may be asking yourself "Where is this place they have chosen"? WISCONSIN DELLS, WISCONSIN!!! I'm sure you thought it would be somewhere warm and sunny. We enjoy going to waterparks and wanted to see what was so special about The Dells. Rather than driving the 14-hour trip in one day, we opted to split it up and spend the night in St. Louis. We've heard St. Louis is a fun kid-friendly city.


On Friday (05/22) we loaded up the van and left our house bright and early so that we would be passing through Sikeston, MO around lunch time. I have always wanted to eat at Lambert's Restaurant. The original is located in Sikeston and we had to pass through there to get to Saint Louis.



We had to wait in line to get in but apparently there is a line any time you go...and the food is well worth the wait. The kids were really excited every time the roll guy came around our section. Jackson even caught a roll! Unfortunately, I do not have a picture of the rolls flying. The interior is decorated with many antiques. One interesting group of items were the old license plates on the back wall. Some were turned to spell the words "HOT ROLLS":



We pulled into St. Louis at 3:30 pm and immediately went to the Arch. According to their website the tour takes approximately one hour and they were open until 5:30 pm. Plenty of time, right? WRONG!!! Just outside the parking garage was a ticket window. When we told the man we wanted to purchase tickets he told us there were no more tours available for the day. BUMMER!! How in the world could they not be allowing anyone else up for the day??? So, we decided to go to the museum under the Arch. We had to walk through a beautiful tree-filled park to get to the Arch---very peaceful and serene along the banks of the Mississippi River. As we got closer to the entry door we began to understand the reason for no more ticket sales that day. We had to stand in line to go through security (same as airport security--checking purses/bags, baskets & conveyor belts for items in your pockets, walking through metal detectors, etc.). Then we walked down a ramp that led to the "Grand Central Station" of the Arch. This main corridor held the two entrances to go up into the arch, the restrooms, the main ticket office, a gift shop, general store, two movie theaters (movies about the history of the Arch), museum, and information desk. There were hundreds of people everywhere. We opted for the museum which was very interesting and bought tickets in advance to go to the top of the Arch for the next day. Afterwards, we went to a hotel, ordered pizza, and rested for the big plans we had made for Saturday.



Saturday morning we got up early, as always. and went to the St. Louis Zoo at 8:30 am. The St. Louis zoo is a great zoo. The coolest was the Peguin and Puffin exhibit. There was nothing between you and the animals. Once I thought a penguin was going to peck Chloe's head. We were splashed by water when they jumped from the rocks into the water. The hippos were fun too. I've posted a few other picks of our favorite animals.











Don't you just LOVE his expression! I wonder what he was thinking?!?







We spent five hours at the zoo on Saturday. Many people would think that five hours is plenty of time to walk around a zoo...well, not the St. Louis Zoo. We saw about half of the zoo during that time. The zoo is free, except some of the special things. We did all the specials on Saturday (Carousel, Children's Zoo, Train, 3D Dinosaur interactive movie). We stopped in St. Louis on our drive home and spent Sunday (05/31) touring the remaning sections of the zoo. We loved it!!

Waiting for Jackson's favorite part to start---the 3-D Dinosaur Adventure movie. He cried at the end...not because he was scared but because 1) the movie was over and 2) there was a picture of a diplodocus on the movie poster but there wasn't one in the movie. Only Jackson would pay attention that that sort of detail!!

We had to leave the zoo at 1:30 to get to the Arch by 3:00. It was only a 10-15 minute van ride but we had to allow time to park in the paring garage, walk to the Arch, and stand in the enormous line for security. Then we stood in line for an hour to get in an elevator to go to the top. There are eight elevators at both the norht and south entrances to the Arch. Each elevator is a tiny egg shaped compartment which holds five people (imagine the egg form "Mork & Mindy"--seriously!). We were cramped in ours and we had three small children. We saw five guys in their late teens/early twenties get out of one. It was like a clown car. Anyway, all eight elevators leave at the same time--every 10 minutes. I would never have imagined that so many people would go to the top of the arch every day. Most of the tours for Saturday were sold out too. Crazy!!

As you saw in the above picture, Jackson was not a big fan of the trip to the top. He started telling us on Friday that he was not going to the top, again in the security line on Saturday, and all the way to the top. Our egg was quite claustrophobic and he was in tears the entire way to the top. I tried to breathe slowly and reaaure him, all while I am trying my best not to have a panic attack myself. Once we made the four-minute ride to the top (630 feet), we exited the elevator and climbed several stairs to get to the viewing windows. The top was also very claustrophobic. So many people crammed into such a tiny space. Even though 80 people arrived every ten minutes, you were allowed to stay at the top for as long as you wanted. We were shoulder to shoulder with people, I was extremely nauseated, and Jackson was still in full panic mode so we stayed for only a few minutes.




The Arch is an amazing engineering feat. It is the same width across as it is tall. You can feel it sway at the top on windy days, or so the guide said. You could see the Cardinals' stadium from the top as well as much of the St. Louis skyline. We were told that you can see for 50 miles on a clear day. The Mississippi River was flooding, so that was amazing to see from the top.

We left the Arch around 4:30 pm and headed north. We stopped at a Dairy Queen for dinner somewhere in the middle of BFE Illinois to celebrate my 35th birthday. It was the only exit for almost 70 miles with food and our only options were Dairy Queen or McDonald's. I didn't care where we ate dinner as long as we were together. I love my family!! We made it into the Dells at 12:30 pm, exhausted, and in much need of sleep.