As we were putting together our travel plans a couple months ago, we needed to figure out where we might get our annual motorhome service completed. Our rough timing was going to put us somewhere in the middle of nowhere in South Dakota but we figured it might make sense to move that up in the schedule to occur in a more populated area. We found options in both St Louis and Kansas City but unfortunately neither of those took reservations. So we decided to keep the next section of travel highly flexible to accommodate possible delays getting the work done. We had reserved a spot at a Corps of Engineers campground on Carlyle Lake to get us through the pending weekend allowing us to head for service bright and early Monday morning. We typically find COE campgrounds quite nice and we hoped Dam West Recreation Area wouldn’t disappoint.
The drive was about 170 miles and only had issue the last little bit getting into the campground. Our GPS kept informing us there were some low weight limit bridges to get into the campground. We checked in advance and didn’t find any thing to worry about so we simply followed the directions provided with our confirmation email. This area of the country has been experiencing lots of rain and flooding and while our site was fine, there was a lot of standing water all around the campground. We came in late on a Friday afternoon and the nearly 100 site campground was approaching full.
I suspect this is a nice place to stay but we had several days of rainy and dreary weather. We got out a couple times to check out some of the nearby sights. The water being released from the dam was pretty substantial but that didn’t keep fishermen from trying their luck from the banks of the downstream Kaskaskia River. We did see one guy pull out a pretty good sized fish. A bit further downstream, we found a neat old suspension bridge back over to the other side so we could make a loop of our walk. Not the ideal situation but nothing could be done about the weather so we made the most of it.
Our Waterlogged Site
Foggy Fisherman
Overlooking Dam
Interesting Dam Gates
Cool Suspension Bridge
Marina Near Campground
We left on Monday morning to blue skies and glorious sunshine. We only had 30 miles or so to get to Truck Centers Inc in Troy Illinois. This was an impressive place. They have several dozens of service bays and a completely different building just around the corner for body work. There is even a covered entrance so customers can pull up in their rig and go in to have the service work written up without ever getting wet. They have a nice waiting area with lots of seating and a big screen television for all the truckers waiting for service. The WiFi speed wasn’t the greatest but worked. We got in around 9:30 and we pulled out around 4:30. It was a long day but the coach is now happy for another year.
This is were our flexibility was going to come into play. We had scoped out multiple options depending on when we got on the road. There were a couple Elks Lodges near St Louis - one to the north and one further west. We figured we would see how bad rush hour traffic was but guessed we would stop at the one further west in O’Fallon. Chris called the lodge but found that all the electric hookup sites were full and while we could boondock there, I was pretty well rested so we pushed on to the Elks Lodge in Columbia Missouri for a 190 mile day.
Traffic wasn’t too bad and the only annoying part of the drive was heading into the setting sun. We pulled into the lodge’s parking lot and find about a dozen cars and headed into the bar to figure out the scoop. There are 50 amp outlets on six of the lampposts around the parking lot that surrounds the building. We pick one on the backside just to be out of the way of members coming and going. It wasn’t real level but we made it work. We head back into the bar for just a couple beers since we were too late for dinner. This lodge states that the parking is free for traveling Elk, but given they have 50 amp electric, we make a donation and say we will be staying at least 2 nights, maybe four.
Our next reservation in southwest Minnesota isn’t for 6 nights but we have a rough idea of where else we might stop along our way. We figure it will amount to three additional stops after this one in Columbia. We spend the rest of the evening trying to figure how to divide the days between our stops. Rock Bridge Memorial State Park isn’t far from the lodge, so we spend most of the day exploring it. There are quite a number of trails in the park but it seems like the popular spots are the Devil’s Icebox and the Natural Bridge. This area has a karst geology which creates lots of sinkholes, caves and bridges in the landscape. We find the area has some good elevation changes and we are still acclimating to Hills after spending nearly 5 months in Florida.
There is a long set of stairs that lead down into the entrance of the cave. It quickly becomes apparent why this is called Devil’s Icebox - the temperature drops substantially as you head down the stairs. This would be an interesting place to explore but alas we were not prepared for a cave hike. The entrance sign recommends a hard hat and 3 light sources per person! I guess that means a backup and a backup to the backup. We also hiked the 1.5 mile Sinkhole Trail. There were numerous wildflowers in bloom at this point in the season. It was a nice park for a hike.
Heading Down to Devil's Icebox
Mossy Rocks
Inside Cave with Warning Sign
Blue and White Flower
Natural Bridge
Exterior View of Limestone with Large Cracks
Nicely Maintained Log Cabin
We had decided that the two nights in Columbia was enough and we would head to The Elks Lodge in Blue Springs MO. This would get us very close to Kansas City so we could do a little exploring there. It was an easy drive over to Blue Springs. The RV parking area is in a gravel lot adjacent to the large paved lot around the lodge. It is situated on the side of a hill and while they have brought in what appears to be crushed asphalt from a torn up road, the site is still sloped a fair amount. They have 6 full hookup sites and two rigs were already there. Two of the sites were taken up by one motorhome and all of its outdoor furniture and rug setup in their adjoining site. As long as somebody else didn’t show up. We headed into the lodge to register with the bartender. We were told they would be having dinner that evening so we setup and then headed out to explore the area before dinner was served.
Turns out the oldest active geocache in Missouri is hidden just on the south side of town. We figure we had time to drive over and get with time to spare. Road construction on the expressway loop around town ended up causing me to miss the required exit and before we knew it, we had crossed into Kansas. It worked out fine though, since we were able to find our first cache in Kansas as we worked our way back over to our real destination. It was a nice little path along Indian Creek with a few people out fishing. Based on some of the debris along the trail, this creek had recently been flooded and was still running high and fast but the geocache was high and dry and with that, we could head back to the lodge for dinner.
We have stayed at dozens of Elks Lodges in the past couple years but this one might be the nicest one we have visited. We grabbed some beers and picked out a table with a great view of the surrounding property. So many lodges are dark and claustrophobic feeling but this one has a large bank of windows and an outside area for additional seating and smokers. While we waited for dinner to be ready, a guy walked up and started chatting with us. He knew we weren’t regulars. We mention how nice this lodge is compared to most. He asked if we wanted a tour of the place and took him up on it. It’s a newer building and has all sorts of facilities that can be rented out for parties or receptions. But the time we got back from the tour, the meatball subs were ready and we enjoyed our dinner while chatting with another local couple. We will need to remember this place for future visits to the Kansas City area.
Staying two nights at Blue Springs will allow us to explore at least some of KC. Our first stop is to visit the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. Entry isn’t too difficult, just show a picture ID and go through the metal detector. They don’t have guided tours but most of the displays in the large building are fairly self-explanatory. Pictures are permitted of all the displays but not in the viewing hallway of the vaults and machinery. One wall displays all the coins that were being produced during each president’s term in office. If I counted right, there were 18 in production during Ulysses S. Grant’s years in office. By the time we were born, the coin count was down to five.
At the Federal Reserve Bank
One of the Entrance Statues
Large Seal in Wall
Various Bills from 1861 through 1999
The most impressive display was a gold bar weighing in at 389.27 ounces (~24 pounds) which was worth $509,449 at the day’s price for gold! In the vault area, they have several automated fork trucks to move the money in and out of the huge vault. One of the big machines used to count the money was opened up and being worked on by a technician. On the way out, they have a huge bin full of shredded money, free for the taking. It’s an interesting novelty but we pass.
Gold Bar with Convenient Carrying Handle
Free Bags of Money!
Just down the street from the bank is the National World War I Museum and Memorial. We don’t take the time to enter but do check out the tower and other elaborate stone work on the surrounding grounds. From the plaza at the museum, there is a great view of downtown. There is an wonderful fountain right in front of the old Union Station building. The Henry Wollman Bloch Fountain has 232 water jets in 3 concentric rings. A computer controls the jets to produce ever changing water displays. Inside Union Station is quite impressive. There are various shops inside the former train station. The model railroad display in the one end of the place is quite large. They have a mixture of various gauge tracks setup with intricate towns.
National World War I Museum and Memorial
Overlooking Downtown KC
Small Section of Large Carved Stone Mural
Fancy Fountain
Ornate Ceiling in Union Station
Elaborate Train Setup
A Welcome to the Model Railroad Layout
Even More Train Tracks
Old Railway Signs
On our way out of the area, we run into one of the volunteers that helped to create some of the displays. We talked with him for 20 minutes and he gave us the rundown of how Union Station was in really bad shape back in the 1980s and nearly torn down. In the late 1990’s, it was completely renovated and is now kept in nice shape. Not surprisingly, the back of Union Station is next to a series of real train tracks. A bridge allows pedestrians to go across the tracks to get to the other side of downtown. From the bridge, we could see (and smell) a BBQ restaurant - Jack Stack BBQ. Since it was lunchtime and KC should have some decent BBQ, we decide to give it a try. It turned out to be a great choice. My ribs were delicious.
A Pedestrian Bridge Across Real RR Tracks
The 1909 Home of Western Auto
Old Commercial Building Turned into Lofts
Colorful Mural Inside Union Station
Right next to Union Station was some unique artwork that we had first seen from the overlook at the WWI Museum but were unable to determine exactly what it was. We work our way to get a good viewpoint of the thing as it moves with the wind. Fortunately it was a fairly breezy day so there was lots of action. I needed to look up what the thing is since there were no real signs identifying it. It’s called Reflecting Motion and is comprised of 78,000 holographic streamers connected to 13,400 feet of rope creating about 12,000 square feet of kinetic artwork. It was rather mesmerizing to watch. Here’s a picture and a short video of it in action.
Reflecting Motion at Union Station KC MO
We continued to explore more of downtown doing a bit of a tour of The Link. This is an elevated, climate-controlled pedestrian walkway that permits people to get around town without the need to go out in the heat or cold. Our tour guide, if you will, was a geocache that had you go to many different locations, all found inside the walkway. At one point we ended up very close to the Hallmark Card Museum so we felt obligated to at least check it out. There is a video that details the history of the company from some very humble beginnings to what it is today. The rest of the museum was okay - there’s only so much you can with greeting cards as the subject matter. By the time we finished up our short tour of KC, it was late afternoon and the feet were quite sore. We obviously didn’t see much of the town, but it would have to do for now.
The Hallmark Card Building
Abstract Art Downtown KC
The next couple of stops would just be to get us up to our campground in Minnesota. Our route would be up Interstate 29 through Missouri and Iowa. Unfortunately this route is close to the Missouri River which is having all sorts of flooding problems. Our original plan was to make it up to Nebraska City NE and spend the night in a Walmart but the bridge that would take us across the river from I-29 was closed. Rather than trying to find alternate routes that were open, we just decided to head away from the river and stop at a Walmart in Shenandoah Iowa. This worked out well and was reasonably quite overnight.
The next morning we planned on heading to Sloan Iowa to the WinnaVegas Casino Resort. We had seen that I-29 near Omaha NE and Council Bluffs IA was closed from flooding for several days and figured we would need to put in the extra mileage to account for the detour. We were rather surprised to find out that just before we pulled out of Shenandoah, they had just reopened the interstate! As we drove up through that stretch of expressway, it was clear just how bad the flooding had been. The road itself was now dry and cleaned of debris, but the surrounding landscape looked like lakes. The only giveaway that they weren’t lakes, was when you saw the barn or farmhouse in the middle of the “lake”. The farmers won’t be planting their crops anytime soon.
The town of Sloan Iowa is small but for some reason the casino is miles out of town in the middle of nowhere. But the RV camping area is reasonably nice with big flat sites and 50 amp power. Other than Chris going in to register and pay, we didn’t even check the casino out. I had found there were a series of geocaching puzzles in the area so I spent some time trying to solve them. I got a handful of them figured out and headed out to search for them while Chris stayed put. Only one other rig showed up before dark. There did seem to be a constant stream of cars coming to the casino probably for the dinner and gambling but all that activity takes place in a completely different parking area so noise wasn’t an issue. This was a good stopping place for a one night stay. Next stop: southwestern Minnesota.
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