Westward Ho

 After Washington DC, we turned our nose west and headed out with any real destination in mind.  We had a vague idea of stopping in Branson Mo for a show and Picher Oklahoma where we have family history.

A storm our first night inspired us to stop and overnight at a Walmart in Virginia, right at the border into Tennessee.

We then crossed into Kentucky and while meandering along decided to visit Mammoth Cave National Park.  There was a Thousand Trails nearby that had room, so we updated the GPS and changed course.

We were at the Thousand Trails only for two nights.  We went up to the National Park the morning of the second day and unfortunately found that all the tours of the cavern were sold out.

Oh well.  But the grounds of the National Park were quite nice and Ginger got a good workout on a nice long walk.

After Mammoth, we got back on the road and again headed west.  We then made a wrong turn and ended up on the road to St. Louis.

We hadn't planned on going to St. Louis, but figured what the heck.

We got into a Casino RV Park just across the river from the Arch.  The Casino was undergoing renovation with most of the features you'd expect in a Casino closed - Just one bar and a corner Deli for food.  We decided the Casino wasn't really for us, so we took the Metro across the river to the Arch. 

The Arch was quite fascinating and you can ride to the top in little pods and experience one of the best views we have ever seen.  

We highly recommend it.

We have had a couple of mechanical issues.  

First, our steps broke.  A rivetted part came un rivetted.  We discovered this when we were preparing to overnight in the Walmart we mentioned above.  We got some nuts and bolts from the hardware section in the Walmart and proceeded to "bush fix" the steps.  The bush fix will probably hold until we get home.

The other major thing was that passenger side mirror glass fell out of the mirror while running down the highway.  The heater wires kept it from hitting the asphalt and we managed a probable permanent fix while in St Louis.  Just in case though there is a bit of duct taped helping hold the glass in for a while.

Duct tape makes it all better

Just  as we were getting ready to leave St.. Louis, the dog decided to puke on the bed.   While we have laundry equipment on board, the stuff that needed washing was too big.  That necessitated a 1.5 hour stop at a roadside laundromat.

We eventually made it to the Oklahoma border and decided to spend two days in a Casino RV park in Quapaw just outside of Joplin.  Other than the fact that the Downstream Casino is a very fine Casino/Hotel resort with an excellent (no sewer) RV park, the reason we stopped here was to explore the town of Picher Oklahoma where we have family roots

October 9. 2021