Historic Route 66 - Day Four

Today was a short sight-seeing day.  Just a few miles from where we are staying is Route 66 State Park.  The park it self is mainly hiking and biking trails with picnic areas, but it has a somewhat troubling history...it also has an excellent Visitor Center on Route 66.

We spent some time chatting with the woman at the desk.  Not only did she give us some great brochures, but she told us specifically what to watch for and what not to miss.  What she gave us also covers the tiny bit of Kansas and part of Oklahoma.

They one of the best museums I've seen.  They have been loaned hundreds of Route 66 artifacts... photos, menus, room keys.  They also have terrific original signs.

Historic Route 66 - Day Three

Day three of our travels on route 66 didn't involve a lot of driving.  We are staying at a KOA about 30 minutes west of St. Louis and we are staying on Route 66.  It's a great place to stay and it's nice to be able to go back into the city without the trailer attached. 

 

Historic Route 66 is and was sort of a profusion of "optional", "city" and "truck" routes in St. Louis.  Other areas are areas that even the EZ Guide book says should be skipped. 

We went to see the Arch on a Sunday.  If we have to do any city traveling we seem to find Sundays a day to do it when there isn't much daily work traffic.  Sure there are more people out and about, but this time of year it isn't too bad.  Randy bought a combo ticket for us to go to the top of the Arch and to take a paddleboat cruise on the
Mississippi River.


The Arch is beautiful...it makes you wonder...how does it stay up and how did they do that?  Technically the Arch and surrounding area is the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial.  Inside one of the legs of the Arch contains the Visitor Center, Museum of Western Expansion, Gift Shop and access to the towers.

We took the trip up to the top....the ride up there is the real experience.  You climb into a little "pod" with a 4 ft high door and seats for 5....make that small seats for 5.  You have to scrunch up and bend your head.  The ride up takes 4 minutes...the ride down takes 3.  There's a lot of stairs to climb...both before and after you get out of the pod.  You can stay up on top as long as you like. 

After our Arch experience, we walked across the street to get the on the paddle boat "Tom Sawyer" for our river tour.  We decided there really isn't much to see along the river in St. Louis...but there is so much they could do with it.  The weather was very nice and it was a nice cruise.

We drove over the Edward Jones stadium.  Randy wanted to get is picture taken with the Seahawks flag in front of the stadium, but there was nothing on the outside of the stadium to even show that the Rams play there, so we just scrapped that idea.

Our next goal was to get Historic 66 and find Ted Drewes Frozen Custard.  We found it and tried our first "Concretes".  Very good.... It's a very busy place with walk up service only.  They have several benches along the street so you can sit outside and enjoy your frozen custard.

When we left there we were going to find another one of the "giants" that Route 66 is famous for.  Apparently, the giant farmer and son have been removed.  We found the spot and there was nothing there.

Historic Route 66 Day Two...

Day 2 of our Route 66 journey started early. 

Randy had to try to get us out of the campsite where we had spent the night.  He did a great job of maneuvering and backing into a jackknife position to get us out of there. 

We headed into Pontiac IL to continue where we had left off....

We managed to find a spot to park the truck and trailer.  Nothing was open yet in town, but we had a geocache we wanted to find.  As we were trying to pinpoint the cache an older gentleman walked over to cross the street near us.  He started chatting...found out we were tourists and gave us a ton of information on Pontiac...about the murals, museums and even the Farmer's Market two streets over.

Pontiac was a fun place to visit.  We had spotted murals painted on the outside of some of the buildings. So we followed the walking footprints on the sidewalk to find them.

The 19 murals were all painted in one weekend as part of the Walldog Summer Bash in 2009.  It was a lot of fun to wander around a few blocks and see all the wonderful art work.

We also "toured" Bob's bus and the Route 66 Visitor's Center.  Talked to several people about the highway, the town and where we were going.

We found the Farmer's Market and there were lots of fresh veggies and baked goods.  I also saw some very interesting jams and jellies...from the usual apple butter, peach butter, and cranapple to beer jam and bacon jam.  I sampled the bacon jam and it certainly was different.

Further a few miles down the road is the town of Lexington IL....just north of Lexington is a section of the old highway you can drive on or walk on.  It's called Memory Lane....we were told the gate might be closed for driving, but you could walk...it would be about a mile.  The gate was open, but we decided we didn't want to take a chance on what we might find with the trailer on.  I ended up walking the highway and Randy drove ahead and found a place to park with the trailer.  It was nothing spectacular for scenery...only a couple of billboards and a couple of recreated Burma Shave signs. But I can say I walked part of Route 66.

The town of Atlanta IL has a small park with signs depicting varies aspects of Route 66.  There is an interactive display where you can push the button and listen to a man tell about his travel in the army and his return to Atlanta. 

Atlanta is known for it's water tower with the "Smiley Face" painted on it.  Atlanta also has one of the "Giants" that Route 66 is famous for....The Bunyon Giant...the giant hot dog was added later.




We ended our day in St. Louis MO...a total of 238 miles from where we started in Pontiac IL.

Historic Route 66 - Day One....

Day One – Route 66 - 60 Miles

  

We started the trip on Route 66 with a stop at the Visitor’s Center in Joliet Il.  When we decide we want to stop somewhere we always have to think…can we get the trailer in and out or parked?  We found on street parking about ½ block away from the Visitors Center…we had to feed 2 parking meters.

The bldg. also contains a museum for the city of Joliet.  We didn’t pay to see that, however we did get a little peek when she let us go upstairs to the bathroomJ  They have some cool Rt 66 stuff in the lobby area including a mural “map” on the wall of the 8 states the highway went through.  This mural was created by the author of the mile by mile guide we are following…EZ 66 Guide by Jerry McClanahan.  

We grabbed a couple brochures and a map and spent a few minutes talking to Elaine at the desk in the gift shop.  She gave us a couple of photocopies of a map that had some recommendations tagged on them.  She also gave some personal choices she liked…good places to eat and some things not to miss.  She had an album of photos that she had taken when she traveled the route.  She also pointed us the right direction to head out of town and assured us we wouldn’t be in traffic for long.

We know there are things we may not be able to stop to see…we just can’t take the trailer everywhere.  But we did pretty good….

Gemini Giant – at the Launching Pad restaurant (restaurant was closed). 

No place to park at the Polka Dot Inn…I just had to settle for a quick drive by photo.

Dwight Il – spent some time chatting with the guy at Ambler’s/Beckers Texaco.  This is a visitor’s center.  There were some great things on display.  He gave us route 66 pins and also a tootsie pop.  Mr. Becker who owned the station for years used to give tootsie pops to all the kids (sometimes parents too) that stopped by.  He told how to find the Frank Lloyd Wright designed bank building in town.  We went across the street to have lunch at the Old Route 66 Family Restaurant.  The food was pretty good.

Odell – We found the 1932 Standard Oil Station.  Nice restoration.  The items in the garage bays reminded me of things my dad used to have in his auto repair shop.  Grabbed a geocache while we were there.   

 

Pontiac IL– Stopped at the North Creek Bridge to check out the original Hwy 4 bridge marker painted on the concrete bridge rail.  Took a few pictures and tried to find a geocache.  Not easy to poke around on a bridge these days.  Too many people and you look really suspicious.

Day one covered only about 60 miles of Route 66.  We decided to spend the in Pontiac – rest will wait until the next day to do our sightseeing. 

 Our main goal now was to find a place to park for the night.  Our day had started early in Elkhart IN so by mid afternoon we were tired.  There really aren’t many places.  We have a list of campgrounds along the route…but not many.  Randy found a campground online while I was taking photos.  We plugged the address into the gps and headed out.  We never quite know where our “Little Miss GPS” is going to take us.  This time it was about 17 miles sort of the opposite direction.  We made several turns…all the roads were narrow and through miles and miles of corn fields…and then we were on gravel…all the while are GPS is telling us to proceed with caution…as you turn off the “main road” onto what seems to be a long driveway you start to wonder what you got yourself into and how are you going to get out of it.  We eventually saw some RV’s…When we finally found someone to help us, Randy went with him to check out the site (we had already paid for). 

When a park advertises that they have 150 sites you would think this time of year you would be able to get something easy to park in…We drove down a hill and under a canopy of trees…rough ground…and no other road out.  Randy’s challenge in the morning will be to see if he can make a tight U- turn or perhaps try the infamous “Y” turn with a 36’ trailer attached.  Thankfully it didn’t rain, because it looks like it would be really ugly.  I’ll let you know what happens……..

Bucket list item #2

NFL HOF

 

Canton, OH 

 

What an honor to be able to go in and learn about NFL football and the greatest players that have made the game it is today.

 



We didn't plan it this way but it happened to be The Halls 50th anniversary and was Community Day so tickets to get in were half price and they had several side events happening. NO we didn't ride Thomas the Train!!! We did attend a seminar on the evolution of the helmet was very entertaining and informative.

 

They have 2 floors of exhibits and artifacts that were quite informative and interesting. It was cool to see Steve Largent's, Cortez Kennedy's and Warren Moon's Bust and Memorabilia in The Hall!! What was even more impressive was even though they are not enshrined in the hall there were items from Lynch and Wilson in The Hall.

 

To learn and see how really cool the NFL HOF really is, click on the picture slide show to the right, Enjoy, I know we did. If you get a chance and you're into football this is a must see.

New York New York

New York City was actually quite fun and kind of a cool city where the old and the new meld together as one.

We stayed at Liberty Harbor RV and Marina in Jersey City just a ferry or train or bus ride away.
We did all three to get into the city.

We spent 3 days touring NYC. The first day we took a tour bus from our RV park into and around the city to see all of the highlights. This was kind of an overview tour we took. Having a tour guide to guide to areas we might not otherwise find.  He took us on a walk through Central Park...we saw Strawberry Fields and he told us about the building of the park.  He also took us into St. Patrick's Cathedral.

The next day we took a "Path" train about 4 blocks from our RV park into Times Square where we bought tickets for a Double Decker hop on hop off tour bus. There are about 21 different stops where you can get off and walk around, take pictures and then catch the next bus. We highly recommend this way to tour.  We still walked several miles each day, but it was nice to hop on the double decker bus, ride above the people and traffic with a tour guide to point out all the sights and give us some insight into the history of the city.  This was the City Sights NYC tour. The ticket that we bought for this tour was good for 3 days on the bus and a 90 Minute Harbor Cruise and admission to Liberty Island to view the Statue of Liberty and a night time tour of the city.

The third day we took a water ferry from our RV park over to the Wall Street side of Manhattan where we were able to continue on our hop on hop off tour.

While staying in Jersey City, the PGA FedEx Playoffs The Barclays was happening only about 3 miles from where we were staying. Just so happens that Rory Sabatini was staying in his luxurious motorhome in our park.

So what did we see you ask? Well we spent about 10-14 hours each day in the city. This touristy thing isn't easy when you're old like us :-).
There were quite a few highlights but probably the most emotional was the 9/11 memorial.
Things and places we took the time to see and do were: Times Square, Rockefeller Plaza, The Top of the Rock, Greenwich Village, Central Park, Battery Park, Saint Patrick Cathedral, Strawberry Fields in Central Park (2 1/2 acres dedicated to John Lennon). All in all NYC is pretty damn cool!!!
We took over 1500 pictures in the 3 days we spent in the city. I've paired this down to about 250 or so. You can view them over to the right.

The Bathtub, The Chocolate River? No it's Funday Bay

The three names of the bay with the most extreme tides in the world. It is an awesome place. We went to Hopewell Rocks Provincial Park in New Brunswick. We stayed in a very nice and small RV park about 2 miles from the provincial park. We got there fairly early so as soon as I got the rig setup we took off for the park.

High Tide was at 1:04 PM we got to the park about 3:00 PM. Mid Tide. It's about a 15 minute walk down to the actual beach and Hopewell Rocks. We took about 152 steps down to the beach. the water was only about 20 feet from the shear rock walls when we got there.


Did I say there were probably 250 people besides ourselves?

Within an hour the beach grew to about 60 feet from the shear rock walls. The tide level drops approx. 6 feet every hour. It takes 6 hours to go from high tide to low tide so the level drops about 36 feet. It was really awesome to watch. 

Peggy's Cove, Nova Scotia

They say that Peggy's Cove, Nova Scotia is one of the most photographed places in Canada.  Now I can understand why. 

Peggy's Cove has been one of the places on my must see list for a long time.  My parents were there about 18 years ago and had some pictures framed for me and brought me a couple of souvenirs... after all my name is Peggy.  My mother had told me that there wasn't really anything there...and she was right.  But the photo opportunities are endless.  Even if there is a marine layer.

We took our chances on finding a campground.   We hadn't made any reservations.  We came across one that was right on the ocean.  The owner said we could park on any site we wanted and any way we wanted.  We chose a great site and parked parallel to the water.

The first day right after we set up, we headed to Peggy's Cove.  We soon found out that it was a holiday in Nova Scotia...Natal Day.  This gave a lot of  people a three day weekend. There were bus loads of tourists milling around.   Peggy's Cove doesn't have much for developed areas.  It is a fishing village, not really set up for tourists...but they show up anyway.

There is a visitor Center with a decent size parking lot.  If you can find a place to park there, you can easily walk to everything.  There are no sidewalks on the narrow hilly road through town.  People walk along the road - either side.  The major destination in town is the lighthouse.  It's a short hike from the visitor center.  Everything in town is built on the granite bedrock that is everywhere.  Up near the light house is a restaurant/gift shop.  There is a parking lot there also, but it's difficult to maneuver around the people and buses.  There are a few warning sign, but there are no railings or barricades.  People are free to wander on the granite boulders.

There are a couple of other gift shops that carry Island crafts also.  You can also buy coffee and ice cream all from old houses...that are still old.  The small harbor in town almost looks like it was staged to photograph...Old fishing boats, nets, buoys.. all old.








We also climbed a granite hill outside of town in search of a geocache.  Got some great photos from there.  Randy wanted to walk on the granite near the water.  We found a spot with sort of trail and walked to be closer to the waves.  It was great. 

 

Just a short distance from Peggy's Cove is a memorial created to honor the residents of Peggy's Cove and Blandford for their hard work after the crash of Swiss Air Flight 111 in 1998.  229 people died in that crash and residents of the area worked tirelessly to help with recovery.  The memorial is simply made out of granite. 

Almost everyone visiting in the area stops to walk out to the memorial.

We took some really great pictures.  Make sure you click on the link on the right and then slideshow at the top of the pictures you'll see all of them.  Peggy's Cove was beautiful and serene - in spite of all the people visiting.