The Big Trip, Part 2: St Louis

At last, we arrived at the Amtrak station in St. Louis at about 8AM, waited for what seemed like an eternity with tired toddlers for our bags, then caught a taxi to Brian and Kara's house in University City. Greater St. Louis is comprised of several "independent cities", of which UC is one. I marvelled at the much taller trees than we are used to seeing here in Central Texas.

Normally in late July, St. Louis would be cooler than Austin, probably reaching 90F as a high during the day, at most, while Austin would be in the 100's, possibly hovering around 105-110. This year the weather in St. Louis was about the same, if not a little hotter, than the weather we left in Austin.

We had brought with us our trusty single umbrella stroller for Rachel, but after a couple of long and frustrating walks to the neighborhood park (Joseph W. Mooney Park), Rob and I decided to invest in a double umbrella stroller. Here are the girls on their first stroll in the Babies R Us parking lot. I assembled the stroller in the store before we left, which was nice--they dealt with all the packaging trash/recycling.

 Rob picked up a $2 bubble wand, which paid for itself many times over in giggles and smiles in the backyard.


Natalie and Rachel had so much fun with their cousin, Mamie, pictured here with her daddy, my brother Brian. She was 13 months old, playing with 17-month-old Rachel and almost 3-year-old Natalie. There was much squealing, as you might imagine. Rachel and Mamie pushed and pulled each other on a ride-on toy around the house quite a bit.

 Here's sweet Mamie with proud papa, Brian Thevenot.

 The girls eagerly anticipate more bubbles.

We headed over to the St. Louis Zoo, where the double stroller was key to our overall happiness. It's a fabulous free zoo in Forest Park, and on a very hot Saturday, there was quite a crowd. We wove among the exhibits admiring ducks, flamingos, several species of ape, big cats, a gorgeous butterfly insectary, and several fascinating specimens of the human animal. I think Rob said he counted 14 people on Rascals. One family in particular had a penchant for dropping f-bombs around their toddler- and preschool-age little ones. I think about 1 in 4 adults was smoking. Funny that I used to smoke, and now have been smoke-free and living in a smoke-free city for so long, that it's novel and curious to me when I see smokers.

Here's Brian with his lovely wife, Kara, and 13-month-old daughter, Mamie.

 Brian and the girl cousins, Mamie, Natalie and Rachel. We couldn't get them all to look at the camera at the same time.

 Mamie gets a closer look at an orangutan, trying to beat the intense heat, laying in the shade with a sheet on his body.

 Brian points to one of the dozens of gorgeous butterflies fluttering around the insectary.

This was taken moments before Natalie and Rob made a mad dash to the bathroom, which was somewhat far away and hard to find it. She held it until about 10 steps away from the bathroom door, when she couldn't hold on anymore. Rob's back was drenched. He was a good sport about it--all you can do is laugh in that situation, right? We hadn't packed a spare shirt for him. He took advantage of a waterfall outside one of the animal exhibits to rinse off.

 The guys went to pick up the cars while Kara and the girls and I cooled off in the air-conditioned front entrance to the zoo. Natalie couldn't resist pacing the concrete benches.

 The next day, following Kara's suggestion, I took Natalie on a solo trip to Grant's Farm, about 30 minutes away from the house. Grant's Farm includes the boyhood cabin of former president Ulysses S. Grant, and for the past 100-odd years, has been the exotic game ranch developed and later opened to the public by the Anheuser-Busch family. The fleet of Clydesdales is there, as are dozens of species of wild game and other exotic animals from 6 continents. Natalie and I had a blast. She did not enjoy having her picture taken, so you'll have to take my word for it.

 We saw bison...

Longhorn cattle (just like here in Texas)...

Cebu...

 I caught Natalie looking amused at the exotic bird show, before she realized I was snapping photos again.

 We saw owls...

 A literal rat race...

And a bald eagle!

We saw Daddy's favorite animal, the tortoise. The signs said these tortoises were about 60 years old. Enjoying an early retirement, apparently.

 There was an entire carriage house, which was interesting to Natalie, as it relates to the horses and carriages in the story of Cinderella.

The zebra was a little standoffish, which was just as well. Any closer and Natalie would have run away screaming. She was getting into the pre-nap meltdown zone, so we bid farewell to the animals, boarded the free tram, and got back in our rental car...

 ...where she promptly fell asleep.

 The next day, Brian, Rob and I took the girls to the pool at Heman Park (also in the neighborhood) while Kara stayed back to plan a special surprise for Natalie.

The pool was huge and swimming was a big hit, as was playing in the nicely shaded sand volleyball court.

Rob even did a flip off the diving board! I have video I might try to upload later.

Here's Brian holding sweet Mamie.

Good and exhausted, we dried off and walked back to Brian and Kara's house, where Natalie's birthday surprise was waiting.

 Kara had made a beautiful cake, and we all sang Happy Birthday to Natalie, including Rachel, who kept saying, "Happy Birthday Natalie!" all evening. Natalie blew out her candles and opened her present--an Erica Eggplant puppet and book. She was quite pleased until she realized there weren't any more presents! She kept asking, "Where are my presents?" with distress in her voice.

It occurred to me that we've been talking to her about this trip for months, talking about how she was going to have a big birthday party, and she thought this was it. She didn't realize there would be another party in Louisville, and more presents. So she was momentarily disappointed, then confused when I tried to explain it to her. Kara took the whole thing in stride and with a good sense of humor. (Hooray for wonderful sisters-in-law!)


That night after we finally got two very wound-up girls to sleep, we stayed up late, drinking wine (Kara and me) and whiskey (Rob and Brian), playing Monopoly, and then talking under the stars. It was so nice to have some adult time, so nice that I didn't care if I barely got any sleep at all. And somehow, the next day, the lack of sleep didn't affect me much. At least, not that I recall. :)

 The next day was our last day in town, and it turned out to be another scorcher. Still, our kids thrive outside, so out we went, this time back to Forest Park to a big playscape outside the Missouri History Museum. Thankfully, it was a very well-built, modern playscape, with a nice water feature/drinking fountain.

Rachel explored the shady underside of one of the playscapes, including chime bars.

That evening, we bid a bittersweet farewell to Brian, Kara and Mamie, and set out for Louisville in our rental.

 Hugs and giggles all around.

To be continued, eventually, in The Big Trip, Part 3: Louisville...

Planes, Trains & Automobiles: Our Big Trip - Part 1, The Train

So here it is at last, the tale of our big adventure two-week summer vacation.
On July 19th, my friend Kim graciously picked us up from home on her way to work downtown and dropped us at the Amtrak station at roughly 2nd & Lamar. It's a tiny station and feels like stepping back in time to the 1980's, roughly. I'd compare it to a bus station, but Greyhound might look a little more up-to-date. I'm not sure, it's been a few years since I saw a Greyhound station, I'm grateful to say. While the tattered upholstered chairs outside the Austin Amtrak station reeked of urine, the inside seemed clean enough.

Here's Natalie eagerly awaiting the train at the station.

Rob dutifully hauled our luggage, aside from 2-3 backpacks I shouldered. Yup, that's a cooler in the photo. We had TONS of snacks ready to go.

We had arrived at the station early and ended up spending a long time there. No matter, we managed to keep the girls entertained and their more bothersome behaviors down to a dull roar.
We left Austin an hour late due to a freight train that stopped for repairs before our train made it to the station. Fortunately, the conductor made up the time between Austin and Dallas. We sailed through Fort Worth and Dallas, though I hear Dallas is often where you get stuck for an hour or two. If you're going on a long trip, they mostly make up the time they lose to delays (usually involving freight trains, which have priority on the tracks.)

Funny thing--our sleeper car room attendant looked like strikingly like a human version of the train conductor dinosaur on Dinosaur Train. He didn't seem all that stable, so I didn't mention it to him.

So, how was the train ride, you ask?

The girls LOVED to be able to move around and explore the train. At no point were they saying, "are we there yet?" They were sometimes a handful when they wanted to run around unfettered and we couldn't let them go around and bug people in the observation car.

They adored the bunk beds. Rachel kept saying "bunkabed!" They wanted to get up and down, up and down. The enjoyed the scenery, but seemed more interested in the train itself. It was priceless to be able to move around our sleeper room, the sleeper car, the dining car, and the observation (a.k.a. lounge) car.

The meals were actually decent. Not fine dining by any means, but far better than airplane fare. The price of the meals was included in the price of the sleeper car, so that was a bonus. We ate big meals with desserts.

We met people, which was something I enjoyed probably more than Rob did. I overheard a mom talking to her pediatrician about her son's newly discovered insect bite, lamenting that she didn't have any Benadryl. I had some, so I offered it to her. She eagerly accepted. Later we ran into them at dinner, and they offered to pay for our alcoholic beverages (the only item not included in the price of the meal.) I enjoyed a glass of merlot with my steak.

We brought our white-noise machine, which turned out to be a brilliant idea, because in the roomette next to our family sleeper, there was a loud and loquacious 6-year-old who took to banging on the walls. Her grandma was very apologetic. We later got the little girl playing with our girls, and wished we'd done so earlier in the trip.

The scenery was beautiful, if a little nostalgic and sad at times. The rails cut through some quaint little ghost towns, lush green countryside, industrial parts of bigger towns and cities. In Dallas we passed through a big tunnel with lots of tracks branching off in different directions, and emerged out from under a building several stories tall. We saw highways and byways, from the perspective of maybe 100 feet away. Approaching St. Louis in the early morning, we met up with the vast, shining, mighty Mississippi River and followed its course for maybe an hour. We enjoyed this view over breakfast.

The motion of the train lulled the girls to sleep pretty well, or at least didn't bother them. Rob and I had a bit harder time sleeping; for me it was the noise of the back of the train creaking with every bump and shift. We could hear the train horn frequently, but it was far enough away from our sleeper car that it wasn't a nuisance. The ding-ding-ding of railroad crossings was a frequent accompaniment.

All in all, I'd say it was a success. I'd definitely do it again. My husband is not such a raving fan, but I don't think he's as in love with trains as I am. He says he enjoyed the experience, though he probably wouldn't travel with kids by train again. The girls loved it and I bet they'd get even more out of it as older kids, though in some ways they might be even more of a handful. Being able to physically keep them in the room was a big plus.

Weird thing, sort of--I have bouts of vertigo from time to time. The motion of the train didn't bother me at all while I was on the train, except as it occasionally required my holding on to something in order to keep from falling over. I didn't get dizzy or sick, in other words. But when I got off the train, it took me a full 24 hours to stop feeling like the floor was moving under my feet every time I stood still. My husband did not experience this lingering effect.