Day 18, St. Louis, MO - 74 miles

Sacagawea, Daniel Boone, Kit Carson, Ferdinand Magellan.  They’ve got nothing on me.  On Sunday I went exploring.  Because I thought there may be a more peaceful route from Ste. Genevieve to St. Louis, I stayed up late (past 8pm) on the computer looking for an alternate to our established path.  I found what I thought might be OK and invited some friends on an adventure.  We started on the official route, first across the Mississippi on the Ste. Genevieve-Modoc ferry (which didn’t start running until 9 am giving us a very late start) then on to Bluff Road heading north.  The road was lightly traveled and in the shadow of limestone bluffs.

At mile 13, in the town of Prairie du Rocher, Mary B, Mary D, Lea, Carolyn (the birthday girl) and I took a left turn off route and started on our own.  Within less than a mile I had a flat tire from a huge piece of glass but with everybody working together it was quickly repaired and we were off again.  The route was very nice but the sun was getting warmer and the terrain was very flat and there wasn’t a lot to catch our attention (other than the railroad gates being down and no train in sight so we crossed anyway).

Railroad crossing

When we encountered a dirt road that wasn’t supposed to be there, we headed back out to the main route and caught a tremendous tailwind into the SAG.  At that point Mary D, Lea and Carolyn had had enough shenanigans and decided to stick with the official route.  Mary B and I apparently hadn’t had enough so we headed back into no man’s land onto the levee road and turned north towards St. Louis.

The tailwind was great, the road had very infrequent traffic, and a few clouds moved in providing some relief from the sun. At mile 58, 15 miles out of St. Louis, we had our first view of the downtown skyline and the St. Louis Arch.  We wove through the town of East St. Louis, passed the Gateway Geyser and, after an elevator ride on the route, crossed the famous Eads bridge on a bike-way to our hotel in the shadow of the Arch.

Arch

Today was a rest day so I was on my own to explore St. Louis.  I went to the Arch (although not up it), to the museum and to movies about Lewis and Clark, and the building of the Arch.  The old court house was near so I learned more about Dred and Harriet Scott and the now universally panned Supreme Court decision. Then I went to Bailey’s Range for one of the best burgers and milk shakes I have ever had.

Tomorrow is a short day, most of which is on a bike path.  Now that’s the kind of biking I like.