After canceling many trips in 2020, I wanted to start out 2021 traveling since the future is so unpredictable right now. So on January 1st I booked a flight to St Louis for Martin Luther King Jr weekend to visit a city I had never been to before. And Dad and I had been wanting to take a trip together for a while, but the timing had never worked out, so he agreed to go with me. We left early on Saturday for my 35th state, Missouri. After landing, we immediately noticed the extreme change in weather. It is cold in St Louis! It was even snowing. Luckily I had my new warm Alabama hat to protect my ears, but I realized that gloves would’ve been a good thing to bring.
After picking up our rental car, we headed to a Target to buy gloves and a few other things, but of course they were all out of gloves and most winter gear. We then decided to get some famous St Louis barbecue at Pappy’s Smokehouse, which is considered the best in St Louis. We ordered their ribs and burnt ends with sweet potato fries on the side, and it was all amazing! Dad even joked that it was worth the price of the plane ticket. Burnt ends are popular in St Louis- it’s small chunks of meat taken from the point end of a brisket that usually gets thrown out with the fat, but it’s really good.
From there, we drove to the Gateway Arch, which can be seen from almost anywhere but can be difficult to reach if you don’t know your way around. The GPS is worthless when trying to get to the arch because it wants to take you down some back road that is blocked off. We finally found where we were supposed to park and walked a couple blocks to the entrance of the arch. The Gateway Arch is one of the most iconic symbols of the United States. It represents westward expansion and symbolizes St Louis’s identity as the Gateway to the West. This is where Louis and Clarke started their journey out west and also where the Santa Fe Trail started, which gave access to the Southwest.
The arch itself is the tallest monument in the US and the second tallest in the world, after the Eiffel Tower. It also recently became the 60th national park in the US and my 9th visited. To get up into the arch, first we walked through a museum talking about the arch’s history and then found where the pods are that take you to the top. The door to enter these pods is only 4 feet tall, so we had to duck to get inside. And the pod is extremely small and cramped, with enough seats for 5 people. Luckily it was just the 2 of us due to Covid regulations.
The pod then took us up to the top of the arch, and the ride up took 4 minutes. At the top we had about 10 minutes before our exit pods arrived. The views from the top were amazing! Out one side, we could see the whole city of St Louis. Right in the center of the view was the old courthouse, also part of Gateway Arch National Park. The courthouse is famous as the location of the Dred Scott case in 1857 where Dred Scott, a slave, unsuccessfully sued for his and his family’s freedom. I would have liked to go inside, but it was closed due to Covid. Out the other end of the arch, we could see East St Louis in Illinois. Directly next to the arch is the Mississippi River which separates Missouri and Illinois. This was definitely one of the coolest views I’ve seen before, and I highly recommend it if you’re in St Louis!
We took the pod back down and explored the museum some. We then wanted to get a view from under the arch, which was kinda cool too. Once we left the Gateway Arch, we checked into our hotel which is literally right next to the arch. We decided to stay at the Hyatt Regency, which was a good decision because of its location and safety. St Louis is known to have one of the highest crime rates in the country, so it’s nice being in a central location in the safest area of town. After relaxing for a while we headed over to Union Station. This was a very popular train station serving St Louis in the late 1800s and was one of the busiest in the country. It’s no longer used for trains, so it has been converted into a touristy area instead. There are light shows every 30 minutes at night and stuff like that. But the main attraction at Union Station is the St Louis Aquarium. We toured the aquarium, and it was really nice. It’s not as big and impressive as others I’ve visited, but it’s very interactive and would be a great place to take kids to.
After leaving Union Station, it was already dark outside, so we decided to get dinner and then head back to the hotel. We stopped at Imo’s Pizza, which is another highly recommended spot in the city. We ordered their famous St Louis pizza and toasted ravioli to take back to the hotel with us. It was very good! St Louis pizza is on a very thin crust and stands out because of the special blend of cheese they use called Provel cheese. It’s basically a mix of white cheddar, swiss, and provolone, but it’s really good! The toasted ravioli is a meat filled ravioli that has been fried. It’s another food St Louis is known for, and it’s really good too.
The next morning we got up early to head to Illinois to visit the Cahokia Mounds. We drove to the small town of Collinsville, Illinois, and it started snowing on us just in time to reach the Mounds. Cahokia Mounds is a unique site that very few people know about. The only reason I had heard of it and wanted to visit is because it’s a UNESCO World Heritage Site. But basically it’s the largest ancient Native American site in the United States with the tallest prehistoric earthwork in America called Monks Mound.
While it’s difficult to tell by looking at pictures, Monks Mound is actually really impressive, considering the tools that would have been available at the time. They had to carry basket-loads of dirt to this site one at a time in order to build it up. It was mostly a religious site, while individual homes were constructed in the surrounding areas.
After visiting the Mounds, we made a quick stop at Malcolm W Martin Memorial Park in East St Louis (still Illinois) right along the Mississippi River. This is a very small and hard to find park that gives a great view of Gateway Arch from across the river. It’s not in the best part of town, but it’s still a cool stop to make.
There’s actually a live webcam at this park, so Mom was able to see us live while we were there. From there, we drove back into St Louis and made a couple quick stops on the way to Forest Park. The first of these was an old historic church called Washington Tabernacle Missionary Baptist Church. The significance of this place is that Martin Luther King Jr once spoke there. Considering this weekend is meant to honor him, I thought it would be an appropriate stop to make. We then visited Cathedral Basilica of St Louis, and this is definitely one of the most impressive cathedrals I’ve ever visited!
The cathedral was completed in 1914 and has the largest collection of mosaics outside Russia. It’s just a beautiful building, and I’m very glad we made this stop. From there, we continued on to Forest Park, a popular city park that was much bigger than we expected, similar to Central Park in New York. What is impressive about Forest Park though is that everything is free, including the zoo, art museum, and science center. We came here for the St Louis Zoo which is the most popular site within the park. The zoo was nice, but unfortunately we must have come at the wrong time of year because many of the exhibits were empty. It seems like this would be an amazing zoo during the summer, and there are some cool expansions opening later this year.
After the zoo, we made a quick stop at Shake Shack and then headed to possibly the weirdest place within the city, City Museum. This place isn’t really a museum, though there are some exhibits, but it’s really difficult to explain without sharing pictures. Basically, the whole purpose of this museum is exploration. There are no maps or “correct” ways to see the museum. It’s up to you to decide what you do and how you do it. You want to climb something? Go for it. If you’re wondering if you CAN do something, the answer is probably “Yes.” It’s also an old abandoned shoe factory.
There are so many things to climb on and many slides throughout this museum. There are many weird spots to find, and you just figure out your own way to get there by squeezing through small spaces and ducking to get through others. I love the outside portion of it where you climb through all these random tubes.
The last thing we had to try at the City Museum is the 10-story slide. This slide was much quicker than I was expecting and made me very dizzy because it’s going in circles the whole time.
After leaving the City Museum, we drove around the city some more as the snow was getting heavier. We ended the day eating at Salt + Smoke on Delmar Loop, a popular section of the city for restaurants. It was a good barbecue restaurant, and their mac and cheese is amazing. On our final morning before flying out, there was one last place we had to visit. Park Avenue Coffee is known for their Gooey Butter Cake, which we had to try. It was very good and definitely worth getting up early for. Overall, St Louis is a nice city, and I think that we had just enough time there to see the highlights. Next week I’ll share my travel guide for St Louis, giving advice on how to visit if you’re interested in going too. Thanks for reading!
Tyler's Travels 