Thelma and Louise: El Burro Loco

No, I am not the burro. 🤣 But the picture makes me laugh (my hair is SO FRIZZY here), and makes me laugh even harder with the blog title. Another choice was "alluvial fan" which also is a good photo caption. Ha!

Actually, El Burro Loco is a Mexican restaurant not far from our hotel. We've driven past it several times, and each time I do the bit from Fawlty Towers with Manuel and the butter. Do you know the episode I'm talking about? Fawlty Towers is a British comedy from the mid-70s with John Cleese. It was on the PBS fundraiser circuit when I was growing up, but I think that is a thing of the past given that is WILDLY inappropriate. (I can recite all the episodes from memory though....😉)

So yesterday we went up in the Arch! Gateway Arch is one of our newest National Parks, changing designation from a National Memorial to a National Park in only 2018.

In the 1930s the park was was created both to improve the waterfront appeal of St Louis, and commemorate the role St Louis played in Westward Expansion. The museum is excellent. It instructs on the history of the area from the Osage Nation, clear to the creation of the Arch. It's so interesting to travel somewhere new and learn all about the history. Sure, we know the basics of our nation's history, but not the detailed history of this area. It is so rich with different cultures!

While refreshing our knowledge of events like the Louisiana Purchase, we were also treated to the entire history of how the park was made. The display really highlighted the innovation in the design by Eero Saarinen, who designed the Arch. We also watched the documentary on how it was made. Sure, the design was innovative, but building it was also groundbreaking. They couldn't create a scaffolding because of the curved shape, so they constructed a...thing...on a track of sorts that was strong enough to support the workers and the section they were seating. When that section was complete, they built a new track, and moved their pseudo scaffolding up. By engineering standards that was a terrible explanation, but for the rest of you, it's probably okay? Also, it was just amazing to see this incredible structure completed almost entirely by hand. So much today is automated and computerized - it's easy to forget that things were created a different way. Anyway, if you go, see the documentary! It'll give you a whole new appreciation for the Arch.

Of course, you can also go UP in the arch!

A black and white drawn comic image of three circular tram cars, each filled with cartoon people.

This drawing is from the NPS site and gives a very accurate look at what the tram is like. I'm a little claustrophobic, so I'm pretty glad I didn't have time to think about it before we got in! As we were standing in line, and the guide was telling us what was going to happen, I realized the doorway was teeny tiny, just as she was cautioning not to hit your head.

And the inside! It was like being in a little egg. While there were five seats, I certainly cannot imagine being in that thing with four other people!

At the top, of course, you have amazing views of the city. The very top of the arch is 630 feet.

From there, we went down to the river, and took a riverboat ride. I was explicitly told not to do this by a high school friend, and Amy, you were not wrong! But how can you go to St Louis and not ride on the Mississippi? Working against the tour was the fact that the last riverboat I was on took me on a tour of the Thames... And also working against the tour was the fact that St Louis is not a very pretty city. Industry is not pretty, is not glamourous. And as I have mentioned before, spring has not yet sprung, so there is no greenery to offset the grime. I have a whole other monologue about pollution and recycling, but I've even exhausted myself with it, so I'll save you from it. 😉