Western Expedition Stop 1: St. Louis, MO

In the fall of 2015, I took an epic road trip west with my parents. Our first stop was St. Louis, MO. At only about 7 hours from Chattanooga, it gave us a little time to look around on our first night out.

I really love St. Louis! There are lots of free and cheap things to do and I am completely enamored of the Gateway Arch–it’s like an amusement park ride! And we really liked the history and the wide open spaces of Forest Park. Let’s walk through what we could accomplish in half a day in St. Louis, the “Gateway to the West.”

St. Louis Zoo

We arrived in St. Louis around 3:00 in the afternoon, enough to walk around the (FREE!) St. Louis Zoo for a couple of hours before dinner. And while the zoo is free, parking isn’t. At least the nearest parking lots charge $15. If you prefer, you can park free on the street and do a little walking to a zoo entrance.

This is a fantastic zoo! It’s fairly large, enough that we bought tickets for a train that loops through the entire zoo in order to see more of it. The train cost of $5 per person then (these days it is $7.95 and closed until this spring.) The train itself is super cute. It’s small, with red-and-white striped awnings and goes through tunnels. It’s really fun! There are a few other paid attractions within the zoo, all for about $5 per person and under, but we didn’t do any of those since our time was so limited.

There is a historic feel to this zoo, which I like. It was established in 1910 with a Victorian-looking Flight Cage from the 1904 World’s Fair held in Forest Park in St. Louis. The Flight Cage is still there, and it looks really cool! I can imagine ladies in their parasols and petticoats strolling through here to view the exotic birds.

You could certainly spend more time than we did but I think we saw the majority of it in a couple of hours. I’ll talk more in the next post about all there is to do here, but for now, I’ll leave you with a batch of pictures from our visit.

Forest Park

As I mentioned above, the World’s Fair was held in St Louis in Forest Park in 1904, and there is much to do here today. There are museums of art, history, and science in the Park, as well as lots of concert and athletic space.

We drove through it enough to find dinner at the historic Boathouse and had quite a nice meal there overlooking the small lake and some rentable paddle boats.

Gateway Arch

After dinner, we ventured downtown to take a look at the Gateway Arch. There are plenty of paid lots scattered around downtown but we were able to find parking on the street. We paid very little since we arrived around 6:30 and meters are free after 7:00 pm, so that’s a win!

At the time of our visit, the monument grounds were under heavy construction. We had to walk around it, but the Arch was still accessible. And they made it easy–there were directions spray painted on the sidewalks! I’d love to go back and see what the whole place looks like now. I’m sure they’ve made it into a beautiful riverside park.

You do have to buy tickets to go up in the Arch and I had reserved ours ahead of time, per the instructions on the website that tickets could sell out quickly. Cost is currently $14 (at most) for an adult. When we went, it was $10 but we paid $7 each with my Dad’s senior National Parks Pass.

At the time, you bought your tickets for the Arch in the Old Courthouse, a beautiful building in front of the Arch itself. I had already reserved tickets ahead of time for 8:00 pm, but we went to the Courthouse to see if we could get the time moved up. It wasn’t very busy on a Thursday evening in late August, so we were able to shift it to 7:15 and we walked right over.

Experiencing the Arch

I hadn’t realized how far underground you go at the Arch! You go through a security check and descend quite a ways down into a large open area. There are exhibits to see and a documentary movie, and I think they have upgraded it quite a bit since we were there. There are also a few shops. When I went, one sold souvenirs and the other one was set up like an old-fashioned candy store.

To get to the top of the Arch, you go down even further to board the trams. There are a lot of steps involved, so if you have any mobility issues, this may not be the monument for you.

When you reach the bottom, you are arranged into small groups and parked in front of numbered doors. While you wait for the trams to come down, there is a video pre-show that tells you about the Arch and its unique tram system. It turns out to be like a combination of a Ferris Wheel and a train with 16 capsules in two trains of 8 cars each, one going up each leg of the Arch.

You wait for the folks coming down to get of the tram, then you enter this tiny, white capsule that looks like you’re about to be shot into space. There nothing really to hold on to, just five seats attached to the walls. You’d be hard-pressed to fit five adult people and all their knees in this thing, so I’m glad it was just the three of us. And one of my favorite pictures came from this four-minute tram trip!

As you travel to the top, the capsule will rotate with the curve of the Arch but then mechanically correct itself upright as it goes. As you rise, you can see out a little window in the door while you pass a load of stairs that you are very glad you aren’t currently using.

Once you reach the top, there is a curved space with a series of small windows looking either towards the city of St. Louis or across the river towards Illinois. The middle is almost level, but the edges are at a pretty steep slope. The entire interior is carpeted, and you kind of have to lean over to see out the windows. Again, if you have balance issues, this might not be the attraction for you, but both my parents in their 70’s did just fine.

By changing our ticket time to 7:15, we manage to be at the top at around sunset, so the colors were really pretty! I think seeing it in the evening is a great choice. You are invited to stay as long as you like at the top, then you board the trams again for the descent down to earth.

On to the hotel

After this, I had worn out my parents enough and we sought out our hotel about 30 minutes away. Since we were essentially just passing through, we didn’t need anything that was too central to downtown. Tonight, we stayed in a La Quinta. Quite nice but nothing fancy.

In the next post, I’ll talk about more things to do in St. Louis because there is a lot that we didn’t cover on this trip! Then join me as we visit Sioux Falls, SD for our next stop.