Road Trip Day 15

We managed to escape further storms overnight, but stuff was still very wet: beds, towels, bathing suits from swimming in Nashville on Friday.... we needed to dry out and the weather wasn't cooperating. We all woke up grumpy on Sunday morning. Things didn't improve when Layla and I went to take showers. The shower heads just sprayed everywhere. There was no way to turn them on or adjust them at all without getting totally soaked. And so my pajamas and my Birkenstocks were drenched before I even got in. I also had to stand the entire time on my tip toes to keep from getting fully sprayed in the face the whole time. It did not improve my mood.We did, however, get torn down and loaded up earlier than planned!! We wanted to leave by 9, since we were going to church in the city at 10, and knew we would have to find street parking that would accommodate our van and trailer. We pulled out at 8:45. A true miracle. We drove in and immediately found parking. We were ready at 9:05. And then we discovered that church didn't actually start until 10:15. So we decided to walk around a little and see some of the cool buildings and other old churches in the neighborhood.

When we finally went to church, it was awesome. We had done a little research before the trip. Since we were going to be finding ourselves in St. Louis on a Sunday, I wanted to find a super old, super traditional Lutheran church to attend. This one, Historic Trinity Lutheran Church in Soulard, fit the bill. A bonus was the massive pipe organ.

Everyone was very friendly, and worshiping there was a great way to re-start our day. Our after-church, pre-departure plan was to visit Grant's Farm to see the Clydesdales. It was stiflingly hot, but we had a good time. You have to pay for parking, but otherwise it's free. It is a large piece of land that, at one time, belonged to President Ulysses S. Grant, but now belongs to the Busch family (of Anheuser-Busch) and is used as a zoo/farm/sanctuary for many animals, including several of the famous Budweiser Clydesdales.

We had some snow cones to cool down and wandered the gift shop before hitting the road. From there we drove to Kansas City where we set up camp and discovered the door of the refrigerator in the trailer had popped open at some point during the day and all of our food was warmish. So after sending most of our food to the dumpster, Dave left to go get some new groceries and pick up some BBQ for dinner, the kids went to the pool, and I hit the laundry facilities. By the time we went to bed, we had washed 8 loads of clothes, towels, bedding, bathing suits, and Dave's sweaty cycling stuff. We filled the washers and dryers, plus hung stuff outside and inside the trailer to dry.

 

So happy to have ALL the clothes clean and the towels all dry and no nasty bathing suits. Also, dry beds! License plate stats: still looking for Delaware and Hawaii; 6 provinces.States visited: 16.