This morning we are off to the St Louis Arch which is also known as the Gateway Arch or more formally as the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial National Historic Site. the Arch was opened to the public in 1967. The Arch is 630 feet high (192 meters) and 630 feet wide at the base. The cross section of the Arch is an equilateral triangle. There is a tram that takes visitors to the observation room at the top of the Arch. Underground at the base of the Arch, there is a nice Visitors Center with historical panorama displays and movie theaters.
As we arrived, we had a chance to view the Mississippi River with its many bridges and barge traffic. The river level was way down due to the severe drought we experienced this year. In a normal year, the water would have been nearly up to the road way or about 15 feet higher that it was when we were there. According to Wikipedia, the Mississippi normally flows about 8 times the water of the Rhine River in Germany. This fact helped the Schmid's understand the size of the river.
Lars, Gisela, and me.
If you look closely at the top of the arch, you can see the observation windows.
The exterior skin of the arch is solid stainless steel.
A view from the top of the Arch. Below, you can see the Old Courthouse Museum.
The St Louis Cardinal's baseball stadium.
The stairs leading to the tram cars.
In side a tram car...not bad.
Lars at one of the observation windows. They aren't very big and you have to lay down on the carpeted wall to get a good view or take a photo.
One of the many displays at the Visitor's Center.
The Old Courthouse Museum.
The Courthouse was the scene for the Dred Scott slavery/citizenship case. Scott lost the case in 1846 and appealed to the U. S. Supreme Court. He lost that case as well in 1857. the Supreme Court ruled that Scott was not a citizen of the U. S. and therefore had no right to the freedoms listed in the Constitution. this ruling was one of the factors that lead to the Civil War.
Inside the Courthouse.
We left the and walked to the Spaghetti Factory restaurant in the LaClede's Landing are of downtown St Louis. We had a nice lunch and then headed south out of St Louis to the Ozark Scenic Byway part of Missouri. Our next stop was Maramec Spring Park. We have visited here a number of times and more extensive information and photos are available in several of our previous posts. It is a pretty park so we wanted to share it with the Schmid's.
A butterfly enjoys the day's last sunlight.
Lars checks out the trout at the hatchery.
Georg, Gisela, and Lars.
Missouri Springs are always a beautiful blue iridescent color.
Sigrid loves this place.
We spent the night in Salem, MO and had dinner a Pizza Hut.....the only place open when we arrived. Tomorrow, we drive to Eminence, MO.
No comments:
Post a Comment