Metrolink | St. Louis | City Museum

What do you do on a Saturday, in a new city, with no little one?

You explore! Well, we did, at least.

We started off the day by working out. That’s always fun.

After running a couple miles on the base track, Joe and I cleaned up and headed right back to base to try out the Metrolink. For my fellow country bumpkins who have no clue what I just said, the Metrolink is a train-like mode of transportation, in this case routing from Scott AFB all the way to the St. Louis Airport, making stops along the way. Think bus, on rails.



scott afb metrolink

So we finally figured out how to ticket ourselves, which was half the battle starting out. We rode the metro through IL into MO, getting off at the Convention Center in downtown St. Louis. Now, it’s never a real outing unless I’m either forgetting, leaving, losing, or dropping something. This time it was me leaving my cell phone on the Metro. Smooth. In a moment of panic, we attempted to backtrack our steps, until, at the advice of a sweet older woman, we called it. On the second try, a girl answered, and told me my phone was being held in one of the ticket lobbies at the Busch Stadium (St. Louis Cardinals). Hallelujah. I don’t usually get this lucky with my misplaced things, but this time it really was as easy as hopping back on the metro for two stops deeper into the city and finding the right lobby. I never found the girl who’d turned it in instead of stealing it, but I hope she knows she’s appreciated. 



the dubliner

Resuming our quest of exploration, we foot-trekked our way out of the gameday crowd and back into the city to pick up where we’d left off a half hour before. We crossed a few city blocks and landed at the Dubliner, a very Irish pub in the middle of the city. We ate there, and decided we’d just play the rest of the day by ear.

The woman at the visitor’s center had told us about the City Museum, an obviously popular attraction for both tourists and locals alike. After a few hours of aimless exploration, we located this museum on a map and hiked the 10ish city blocks to find it.

I don’t know why I was so blown away by this place. It’s likely because the only thing I’ve seen that would even remotely resemble it is COSI, and even its luster is dulled to a mute point once you turn 10.



city museum cave section



No. This place is pretty much an industrial playground, for adults. I’ve never seen so many structures, holes, ladders, crevices, slides, or caves 1) indoor, under the same roof, or 2) built with the sole purpose of being conquered up, over, around, under, and through, by any able-bodied person, regardless of age.



giant puffer | i'm in love



The city museum is 10 stories tall. It’s an old industrial building that was converted into a jungle-jim on steroids. Not only does it contain a 10-story aluminum spiral slide, but the rooftop is home to a ferris wheel and a school bus suspended out over the roof. There is a floor with nothing but stone caves and waterfalls. Everywhere you go, there is an option to slip into some sort of hole and travel through it to another room. There is also floor after floor of museum: We saw everything from taxidermy exhibits to an antique doorknob gallery; a room with walls made from the aluminum salad bins you see at restaurant buffets to a half-basketball-court-sized foam pit; a ballroom with a grand piano to a room with human-sized hamster wheels. There’s even a circus school on one of the higher floors, and whole floor with an aquarium housing everything from sloths and sugar babies to adult nurse sharks and sea turtles; an alligator and stingrays to a two-headed python and full-grown river catfish.

Plus there are about 4 restaurants throughout this place, and there’s a full bar on rooftop.

Did I also mention there’s a full-sized circus arena up there, too?



10-story industrial slide!



I could go on.

It was by far one of the most bizarre, far-out places I’ve seen in St. Louis, and it sits right in the middle of downtown.

I would suggest you visit, if you haven’t yet.

Plus it’s open on Saturdays until 1:00AM.

What we thought would be a 1-2 hour visit quickly morphed into almost 5 hours, and we still didn’t see it all. If you ever come and visit us, we’ll be taking you there J. It was a long day, but definitely worth it. We even managed to make it back home via metro without me leaving anything behind.

I.. Am.. Thoroughly.. Exhausted.

Church tomorrow. I’m singing. Word.

xo | cmd

Clydesdales, Grant Farms, & Gateway Arch

Hello, busy day!

We got a bit of a later start than planned, so we skipped making breakfast here and instead made a pitstop at Bob Evan’s [healthy, yeah, I know]. We drove across the river from IL into MO and traversed through some quiet suburbs until we hit Grant Farm, which is a large component of the Anheuser-Busch operation. The world-famous A-B Clydesdales are housed there, along with a menagerie of other gorgeous wildlife.



grant's farm & budweiser clydesdales
eric & joe with a budweiser wagon | cori in the carriage house

Sydni got a full run of exploring as we strolled through the Grant Farm and saw all the animals: Clydesdales, bison & buffalo, goats & kangaroos, peacocks & bald eagles, lemurs, elephants, and a slew of other zoo-like creatures.

st. louis gateway arch

Once we’d checked off Grant Farm, we hopped over to the Gateway Arch, the iconic landmark welcoming all to St. Louis. I’ve only ever driven through the city itself, so this was a new adventure for me. Joe, Eric, Sydni & I got our tickets to the Jefferson Memorial Museum and the North Tram. The North Tram is the term referring to an elevator of sorts. I say of sorts, because this sucker was t-i-n-y. There were 5 seats mounted in each of these little bubbles, and that was literally all the space available. Each little bubble took roughly 4 minutes to get from the ground to the top of the 630-ft arch overlooking Missouri, Illinois, and bits of Kansas in clear weather. It was an interesting experience with a fascinating view from the top.



630 ft high overlooking st. louis & surrounding area

Our last stop after the arch was an impromptu dinner at Caleco’s, a classy little spot we found just walking through some of downtown. The conversation piece there was an exquisite saltwater fish tank complete with baby starfish and a puffer J [because I love some cute puffer fish].

baby star fish | puffer ♥

With our bellies full, we headed back home and rounded out the evening with a stroll around our townhouse community, until we found a grass patch behind it that led straight into Towerview’s parking lot. I told you our church was closeby!

*Yawn. It’s movie time, now, so until tomorrow!

xo | cmd