The heat wave has continued for much of the US, including record breaking heat in St. Louis. We have to admit, we’ve gotten a bit stir crazy sitting in the bus all day trying to keep cool. The drone of the roof top air conditioners alone is enough to be maddening.
This is exactly the type of heat we were aiming to avoid this summer. It just sucks the energy right out of our bones, making it difficult to want to do anything. We had high expectations of making use of this sweet landing ground on the banks of the Mississippi to explore downtown St. Louis more, take the Metro to other parts of the city, spend time at Forest Park and checking out more of the awesome of this city.
The other evening, the weather broke just enough to make walking at night tolerable. We decided it was long overdue for a DATE NIGHT!
Our St. Louis Date Night
We started with a stroll right from our RV Park over the Eads Bridge. This historic bridge was completed in 1874, and was the first bridge to use steel cantilever support structures. It’s double decker, with the Metro train running underneath and cars & pedestrians on top.
The walk gives you some of the best views of the Arch and downtown St. Louis.
After some strolling through downtown St. Louis, we found Joe’s Chili Bowl on the Terrace View of City Park – a wonderful art garden downtown.
We each enjoyed a cup of chili (they serve three kinds, including a veggie and chicken) and split a caesar salad while watching children play in the water fountains in the park.
Next up… it was game time! We’re not sports fan by any measure, but we sure do enjoy an occasional in person Cardinals game. You just can’t experience St. Louis without it, really. We found upper terrace back row tickets for just $10/each, as we tend to prefer just roaming the stadium and experiencing the crowd energy anyway.
After a winning game, we strolled back across the river to the RV Park with a full moon overhead.
A lovely lovely evening, and what a great break from the heat!
What’s ahead?
On the plus side, we have power to run the air conditioners… and our surroundings aren’t on fire. So we are counting our blessings while keeping those who are enduring more difficult conditions in our thoughts.
Regardless tho, the heat wave continues for a few more days – so we’ve extended our stay at the RV Park through the weekend.
Bonus has been enjoying the awesome 4th of July festivities taking place across from us at the Arch – including 3 fantastic air shows (more pictures coming up next!). The festivities continue through the weekend. Providing we can get the energy up, we’ll be heading out for some free concerts.
If there was an easy escape to cooler climates (like we used Flagstaff, AZ for last year to escape the brutal heat in Lake Havasu) – we’d take it. But we do have another round of friends joining up with us early next week that we want to stick around St. Louis for. Hopefully the forecast stays true and the heat wave breaks on Sunday, and we’ll be safe to move back to driveway surfing with family.
We anticipate that a repeat visit to the City Museum (one of the truly greatest man made structures on earth!) will be on the agenda once our friends get here.
After that? We’re tentatively thinking of heading northward towards Madison, WI to visit another friend who just moved there. We hear great things about the city, and it seems like a great place to check out. That would also put us just a hop skip and a jump from Oshkosh, where the big air festival is happening later this month – which has us tempted to check out.
Heading up the Great Mississippi Road in a couple of weeks on our way out west. Wanted to stop in St Louis before heading out I-70. Will you share the name of your RV Park so we can walk to town too? Thanks, Sherri
Hi Sherri – we’re staying at the Casino Queen RV Park. Great location but kinda pricey. If you come here, be sure to study your maps and have them handy – we keep getting lost with all the road closures!
It’s hot everywhere! We’ve been freakin’ roasting here in Vienna. And I don’t mean Virginia.
There are cooler places to be, but they’re all far, far away.
Hang in.
All I could think of when I read this was: YOU ATE CHILI IN THAT HEAT?! Anyway, sounds like a fun date night — glad you got to have one.
Hahaha… it does sound odd, huh? Want to hear something more bizarre? The other day I was craving HOT chocolate, and it was oddly satisfying.
I have a really great file of little known and cheap campsites in Wi- where can I send it to you? D.
Thanks David.. that’s awfully sweet! Our direct e-mail is us@technomadia.com.
I have the same heat related symptoms down here in Fort Lauderdale and was beginning to think that maybe it’s just me. My mother used to say “Mysery loves company!” Glad to know that it’s not just me.
You might want to be considering basement AC in your coach. I am after being in a few with it and almost not hearing it run. There is plenty of room in our buses and rather than replace one of my roof ac’s, I’m planning on getting rid of the aged roof rattlers and getting basement AC.
We’re currently deep in research on our future A/C options 🙂 Considering perhaps a mini-split system – but even that would requite quite the dominoes of re-doing thing on the bus that we’re just not sure we’re up for. A basement air would be nice, but also has a lot of considerations for an already converted bus, not to mention taking a great deal of our basement space that we use for storage.
Hopefully this heat will end soon for us all… ugh.
I just said hi to both of you @ FB. I’m a full timer about 50 south of Madison. You might enjoy checking out the crazy winterized 97 bounder I put a fireplace in.
I got room for a bus for a visit on your way to Madison.
David
Hi David.. thanks for stopping by! Will be in touch directly to follow up!
Hey! Now you’re approaching our neck of the woods!!
Too bad you weren’t here last weekend for Bhaktifest Midwest. Amazing 3 (HOT) days swimming in the Ocean of Devotion, rockin’ it out mantra style with brilliant kirtan bands (Krishna Das, Dave Stringer, Jai Uttal & Donna DeLory among them!) Don’t know if you’ve ever experienced kirtan, it’s one powerful, LOVEfest-ful community!!
We’re a little less than 1/2 hour drive from Oshkosh if you need a driveway to surf on (it’s a steep one, w/a great landing at the top, 400 feet up, sweet little wooded sanctuary, think the bus could make it?) during the EAA show. (We’re 2 + a little hours from Madison) Madison is great, you’ll love it. And yeah, we are so ON for an ease up in this heat situation!! 80’s next week are looking pretty darn divine.
Cool.. thanks for the invite, Debra! We shall see if our plans take us that far, kinda hard to know for sure where we head next. If we do EAA, we’d probably just camp onsite to make it easier. But always enjoy rendezvouses enroute.