Southern US Road Trip: 11/19/21

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Day 2

Iowa, Missouri

After leaving our friends in Iowa, we drove to St. Louis. On the road, we saw more than five humongous windmill blades on transport trucks. While in St. Louis, we stopped at the St. Louis Zoo, Union Station, and the Union Station Hotel. We arrived at the zoo around 2:00 and it closed at 4:00 so we didn't quite see everything, but what we did see was great! Several things were notably different from other zoos we've been too. First, they had underwater viewing of hippopotamuses. While appearing to be clumsy on land, they walk and leap around the bottom of their pond/pool like an astronaut on the moon. They seem to have almost neutral buoyancy. Second, their polar bear enclosure had an ice machine that dumped ice at scheduled intervals. While this isn't as useful in November, this is smart for the hot summer months. And third, the penguin exhibit instead of being completely closed off, had a short wall of plexiglass that you could see over and through. While we were watching the several types of penguins walk jump and swim, one actually leaped out of the water and over the wall. The slightly stunned penguin seemed to roughly bounce on the ground before being led off by a zookeeper. They also had super cool bugs that looked just like leaves, including apparent "dead/decaying" areas on their bodies, and the whole zoo(along with our other two stops) was completely free!

Union Station used to be a running train station but is now a tourist attraction containing a ropes course, aquarium, huge koi pond with fire and light shows, mini golf, a mini mall, and it is situated right next to the "St. Louis Wheel", a 600 foot tall Ferris wheel. We did not do any of these things except wander around the huge station and admire the Koi pond (the fire and light show was unfortunately under repairs).

At the Union Station Hotel, we first stopped and tried out the "Whispering Arch". It is an arch cut into the ceiling and walls of the entryway and if you face the wall, anything said quietly on one side can be heard on the opposite side. It sounds slightly echoey and resounding, and the location has had marriage proposals and other similar things pass through the arch. After that, we waited a few minutes for a light show that takes place in the huge lobby. 14 or more projectors are used to display a brilliantly colored and designed light show on the huge arched ceiling and walls. The beautiful display traced of the carvings and art on the walls and showed flowers, fireworks, and Chinese lanterns to name a few. We then got back in the car and drove south, staying the night in southern Missouri.







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