Kansas City

Kansas City, Arrived!!

I booked a spot at the Longview County Park.  It is only about 5 miles from where I used to live.  It was a little disappointing. The campground was nice and we got a good spot (although not the pull through I had booked) but to get to the lake (it's a very nice, big lake) you had to drive 6 or 7 miles around to the other side.  It would have been nice if a path, foot or bike, had been cut into the woods so you could walk to the lake. Even if it was only to look at it. Very disappointing that there were no walking paths at all.

  We needed to go to Walmart so we got Buffy's stroller out and headed out.
      On the way we stopped at one of the Lake pavilions to see the lake.  While we were there a BIG dog, who was locked up in a car while it's owners fished in the lake, saw Buffy and managed to wiggle out of the car window.  It headed straight for Buffy and grabbed her head in it's jaws.  I swung Buffy up by her leash (thank goodness she was in her halter) and grabbed her and sheltered her in my arms.  While the owners who had heard their dog barking came running and yelling at the big dog.  It ran off thank goodness, but poor Buffy was shaking like a leaf. 
Here's the lake.

Poor Buffy tho, what a bad week for her, first the neck stuck in the gate, then yesterday the dog peed on her face, now today the attack. We gathered her up and went on to Walmart. When we put her in her stroller (she loves to ride in her stroller), but this time she faced the back and wouldn't turn around until almost time we left. Hopefully, she will be better tomorrow.

    We went for several walks the rest of the day, she seems to be feeling better. 

There are lots of dandelions and clover everywhere. I miss them. Really miss the lightening bugs, too.

Mark Twain Cave and Hannibal Missouri

      We arrived at the camp ground in good time. It was a back in sight so we had to unload the car, unhook the trailer, drag it out of the way (Have I mentioned this before?...it’s Heavy!) then back in the RV. It’s getting faster to do. 
    

     Didn’t do much of anything the first day, just rested. It’s a nice shady sight. 












The cave here is famous because when Mark Twain was a boy he lived here in Hannibal and frequently explored the cave. 
He used it in Tom Sawyer and four of his other books.

  The tour guide, who couldn’t have been more than 14, told us all about each section as we came to it and where Twain put it in his book. (Tom Sawyer). This cave was like a maze. Long, 
narrow, and wrapping in on itself, I’d never seen one like it before. Not many features but still really interesting.

Squeezing through18 inch wide pathways.

Floor is completely natural.  No outside cement or other material was brought in to level it out.

   Like Meramec cave it was also a hideout for Jesse James.

After the cave we went to the winery and the restaurant. The winery was very nice. The restaurant was disappointing. I think it was the first hamburger I’ve ever bought, that tasted too bad to eat.

Meramec Caverns

Meramec Caverns

This was a pretty interesting cave it had more water running through it than any other cave except the underground river caves I've been in.

This was a pool of water. The stream actually wound all the way through the cave.  It is an optical illusion, making the cave look really deep. It’s really only a foot or so deep, just very clear and reflective.

More of the optical illustion.

I love caves.  Everyone is different than the one before.  

St. Louis Zoo

Day three we went to the St. Louis zoo. It was amazing. One of the best zoos I’ve ever been in.

We spent most of the day and would have stayed longer but we had to pick Buffy up from doggy day care.

I’ll put more photos on a special page as I clean them up.

   Which brings 
Up another thing that still makes me mad thinking of it. When I took her to the doggy day care (Frolic Inn)  I liked the owner right away, then a young kid came in to take her to the back and when she didn’t want to go instead of picking her up (she’s eight pounds) he drug her across the floor by her neck, with her leash. I actually went over and picked her up and handed her to him. Not a good start...
   But, when I went to pick her up at the end of the afternoon, she was in a kennel, alone and hanging by her neck with her head stuck through the chain 
link fence. She’d crawled up the door a little ways and tried to get through a piece of the chain link. Her feet couldn’t reach the ground they were just slightly perched on the bottom door rail. Her collar was stuck tight in the rail and even if she could have reached the floor for traction she wouldn’t have been Able to get loose. She was Stuck good.
   The boy there now (different kid) couldn’t get her out and I had to go do it. It was hard to get her out, for a while I wasn’t sure I could get her out. I Know I hurt her. Now here’s the kicker..the kid said, “I don’t understand why she couldn’t get loose, I saw her work herself out at least twice today”! WHAT!
If they saw her stuck...
1. Why did she have to get HERSELF loose and 
2. If they knew she Could get her Head stuck in the chain link, why didn’t they move her or block the door? Unbelievable.

St. Louis: day one and two

It’s a very nice KOA.  You’d think a KOA called St. Louis KOA would be in St. Louis tho...it’s over thirty miles out...oh well, found out today, there’s not really anything in St. Louis anyway. 

        We went to the Arch park today and there was nothing there but the arch and the park. No shops, food trucks, booths, nothing. It’s a nice big park but not worth the twenty dollars we paid to park.  

Nashville...Grand Ole Opry

This was Fantastic!

If you ever get a chance to go to the Grand Ole Opry, take it. It was amazing.

We got to see some really good singers.  Two of my favorites.

Teri Clark and Carrie Underwood

 Two new stars that were both fantastic..
Ashley McBryde and Chris Janson.
These are a little blurry, it was really dark inside.

We also saw Darius Rucker, Bill Anderson, and Ricky Skaggs.  

There was a band playing in the courtyard.  They had food trucks, booths, games, photo ops.  It was free to get into the courtyard and there were hundreds of people there listening to the band.  It was great fun.  If you ever get a chance to go, go at least an hour or two early. 

     We almost didn't go.  I called the box office when we got to Nashville, and they were completely sold out. At first I thought oh well, then I decided to try Ticketmaster and see if they still had some for sale. They did! It cost a little more but I'm so glad I got them.  

Nashville day one and two

       Here we are at Grand Ole RV Park. Boy, is it a tight park.  The people are exceedingly nice but for some reason we didn't get our pull through site.  The man who led us to our site helped Bob unhook the car and move the trailer to a spot out of the way.  We got a corner spot with a tree, and it's actually nicer than most of any of the other spots.  This place is PACKED.  Here is a shot of one side of the park (it’s big).

And a shot of our spot. It’s much nicer than any of the others.

They have an outdoor bar with live music every night. Some of them are good, some not so much.

“

One other thing about this park is it’s sitting under a Very Busy rail road track.it doesn’t bother me, I find the noice kind of southing, but there sure are a lot of them, and they are close and loud.

Found out why this place is so packed.  The Country Music Festival is starting downtown on Wednesday.  When we went downtown today half the streets in front of the arena and Ryman Theater are closed off while they build stages and booths in the street. I think I'm glad we got here in time to miss it.  As it was, I had a hard time getting tickets to the Grand Ole Opry tomorrow.  Had to use Ticketmaster as the actual box office was sold out.  I had to pay more, but hey, I got tickets.

     I wanted to go to the Country Music Hall of Fame Museum, so we left Buffy on her own for the first time in the new camper (she was fine) and went into Nashville.  Parked nearby. The three hours it took us to see the Museum and eat lunch cost us $20 in parking.

The museum.

    The museum was nice, they had a traveling exhibits on Loretta Lynn (one of my favorites), Shania Twain, and Faith Hill/Tim McGraw.  In a couple of exhibits they had old Singer sewing machines. (Old singers????)

This was actually taken on the walk from the parking garage to the museum. I believe it's an ad for the other music museum that has a Rolling Stones exhibit.

In the Music Hall of Fame.

The rest of the photos will be on a new page I'm going to make just for museum photos.