MO, IA – Jun 2025

The view of beautiful downtown Kansas City, MO – from the vantage point high above at the National World War I Museum and Memorial.  One of many great stops during this leg of my nomadic summer journey.  Details of this, and many other stops follow in this edition of the Luv2RV blog.

Villa Ridge, MO

Sitting just on the outskirts of St Louis, this was a place that I was supposed to visit back in 2024.  However, I had the truck breakdown while I was staying and visiting the area of Branson, MO and ended up having to skip over this location to get back on my schedule.  So now, this is take two!  There were tons of interesting places to visit around here so off I went.

First up was a visit to the National Museum of Transportation.  Pretty much all forms of transit were represented here – planes, trains, and automobiles.  I’ve been to many auto museums and have seen lots and lots of nice classic cars.  However, there were two specific cars in this museum that I’d not seen before.  First up was this jazzy 1980 Bradley GTE II electric car (at left, bottom left) – one of 50 built in Plymouth, MN.  I also learned that electric cars were first developed in the 1800s.  By 1900, electric cars made up 1/3 of the cars on the road, and ran on lead acid batteries.  The low cost mass produced Ford Model T, coupled with the availability of cheap gas, soon made the electric cars all but extinct.  Who knew?  The other really cool car was this 1963 Chrysler Turbine (at left, middle right).  This thing was slick with its turbine engine and similarly themed design.  There was a video running at this car with Jay Leno talking about and driving this same exact car.  A true collectible!  There were a few motorcycles there, including this 1957 Cushman Eagle Scooter.  Oh how I would love to buzz around on this scoot!  There were also a lot of trains there – including steam, diesel, and electric powered engines.  There were also a couple of planes including this Navy F/A-18.  Sad that they didn’t have any REAL military planes there – you know, ones from the Air Force! 😁

Next I visited a place named in honor of Sophia M Sachs called the Missouri Botanical Garden Butterfly House located in Faust County Park.  This butterfly house is home to over 60 different species of tropical butterflies, and hundreds of tropical plants, enclosed in an 8,000 square foot conservatory.  It is rated among the top 5 butterfly houses in the nation.  It’s a truly unique experience to wander through this glass house and be greeted by and interacting with thousands of beautiful butterflies scamping all around you.  You would even get an occasional curios one to land on you.  While pictures of ones sitting still turned out great, taking pictures of the hundreds in flight really did not quite do justice to how cool it was.  So, I shot some various videos from different vantage points within the conservatory and those videos, combined with various still images, make up this short little video that I created.  I hope you enjoy it!

No trip to the St Louis area would be complete without making a visit to the definitive icon of the city – the Gateway Arch National Park.  It was initially established as a National Monument in 1935 to commemorate the Louisiana Purchase and the continued westward migration of American explorers and pioneers.  In 2018, it was redesignated as a National Park.  It is the smallest of all National Parks, so much so that it is only 2% of the size of the next smallest park – Hot Springs.  The Arch, known as the Gateway to the West, is the tallest structure in Missouri, standing 630 feet tall, and 630 feet wide at its base.  The legs are 54 feet wide at the bottom, and contain a custom tramway car system that shuttles folks to the top observation desk.  Lucky for me, at ground level there were monitors that displayed the observation deck view looking out over the city from cameras facing both East and West.  There was no way I was getting into one of those circa 1950s small enclosed tram cars for a shaky and rickety ride to the top!  I was happy to observe the arch and enjoy the accompanying visitor center from the ground thank you.

There were plenty of Roadside America oddities to check out in and around this town as well.  Claiming to be the largest in the world, this chess piece stands 20 feet tall and sits in front of the World Chess Hall of Fame (which interestingly used to be located in Miami until it relocated here to MO).  Parking in the area was a nightmare, so I didn’t get inside to the museum which reportedly houses lots of chess memorabilia from the likes of Bobby Fischer to Ben Franklin.  It also is supposed to display a chess set designed by Yoko Ono.  Oh well, maybe next time.  Also downtown was the world’s largest gas station sign and at 40 feet high and 60 feet wide, it definitely makes a statement.  Then there’s this giant woman’s shoe – made entirely of thousands of normal sized woman’s shoes.  It once stood in front of the City Museum in St Louis, but was moved here to Clayton and now sits in front of the Brown Shoe Company executive offices   Last up was this statue named “Forces” – a 12 foot tall art piece by sculptor Harry Weber featuring a battle to the death between a bull and a bear.  It was unveiled on Oct 24, 2013 on the anniversary of Black Thursday marking the start of the 1929 Wall Street crash.

A few other Roadside items included this stacked three chair high piece by Brother Mel Meyer.  It is located in Kirkwood, MO, and was made in 1996.  Certainly not suitable for sitting (or climbing as stated on the sign)!

Next I visited this 70-foot tall art piece attempting to claw its way out of the ground.  This piece located in Chesterfield, MO is the second creation of this sculpture (the first is located along the Potomac near Washington, DC) and was done by sculptor J. Seward Johnson.  Definitely cool, and really creepy!

Last up was visit to Pacific, MO which is home to these silica mining caves. They became exposed to outsiders in 1932 when the bluffs were excavated to widen Route 66.  A group of  stone kids sitting in one of the caves is a nice touch!  Also in Pacific is a replica of the original Big Foot that created the monster truck craze.  This truck sits high on a hill near city hall and is quite visible from I-44 that passes by.  The actual original world’s tallest, widest, and heaviest 4×4 Big Foot was supposed to also be in Pacific, but sadly was out on tour at the time.  Normally, it is displayed in the parking lot of the B&H grocery store.

Speaking of the B&H grocery store, since this was to be my last stop of the day, I took the opportunity to pickup some groceries while I was here.  Much to my surprise and excitement, there was a sizable collection of fresh rhubarb there in the produce section.  Needless to say, by the time I left the store, all the rhubarb was gone, and coming home with me.  So, it looks like I’ll be making a batch of strawberry rhubarb jam in the not to distant future.  I’m sure my brothers will be very happy to hear that!  Unfortunately, I discovered that I had left all my canning equipment back at the Florida home base, presumably thinking I had absolutely no expectation that I’d find rhubarb along my journey.  So, I’ll wash and cut up this batch and put it in the freezer until I get back  – at which time I’ll get to canning.  It should do fine until then.  Since it appears now is the harvest time for this wonderful tangy plant, I’ll be on the lookout for more as I do my grocery shopping.  Now I just gotta make room in the freezer to store this stuff!

While not technically Roadside items, I did stumble on a few of my own interesting sites while driving around St Louis.  First up is this White House looking place that is actually Montgomery Bank.  There are other White House themed banks around the country according to Roadside, but this one was not listed.  I might have to submit it for consideration.  Next as I was sitting at a stop light, I happened to see this crazy looking building out my side window.  Turns out it’s a luxury apartment building known as One Hundred Above the Park, offering some amazing panoramic views with its floor to ceiling windows.  It’s kinda pricy with a 500 sq/ft studio running you $2,300 a month, while a full size 2 bed 2 bath 1,000 sq/ft unit will set you back $3,400 month.  Wow!  Lastly, while standing once again at a red light, I noticed I was directly in front of Busch Stadium – home to the St Louis Cardinals.  Not a great representative picture, but what can you expect when rushing to grab a shot before the light turns green.

Oak Grove, MO

My next stop in MO takes me to Oak Grove, just to the east of Kansas City.  Here I caught up with with Kelli – the dear daughter of my dear friends Jim and Joanne.  Sadly, both Jim and Joanne have passed – taken away much too young and too early, but I’m fortunate to have kept in touch with their kids, and will catch up with them as my travels take me in their direction.  Kelli resides in Kansas City these days, and as I discovered after the fact, her brother Patrick resides with her there as well.  So, I got a tw0-fer and go to see them both.  I picked up Kelli mid morning on a Saturday, and took her on a Roadside America hunt with me so that she can get a sense of the retired nomadic lifestyle.  We had a great time touring around Kansas City, got a fabulous KC style BBQ lunch, then later in the afternoon after playing tourist some more, treated ourselves to some ice cream.  It was a great day spending time with her.  Thanks Kelli for playing tourist with me!  And Pat, it was great seeing you again.

There was a fair amount of interesting Roadside places to visit, so off we went.  Actually, there were a few of these that I had done the day before, and included this Mexican restaurant with an airplane on its roof, a visit to yet another one of the circa 1950s Boy Scout mini Statue of Liberty sites, and a visit to a BBQ place that has a man wearing a top hat and carrying a bag full of BBQ delights as their mascot.  With Kelli, we visited this futuristic rocket known as Moonliner IV sitting atop the TWA Corporate Headquarters building..  This happens to be a replica of Moonliner II that stood in Disneyland from 1955-1962.  Pretty cool!  Next we did a drive by of this large needle and button – a sculpture that commemorates KCs garment district.  Last up was this bison skeleton named the Descent of Civilization.  Created by artist Marc Swanson in 2010, to memorialize the demise of the American Buffalo.  Point made!

Next we visited a couple of castles.  The first is Castle Northmoor (at right, left side).  This one-man tower was built by Harlan Shaver between 1981 and 1983.  This 40-ft tower is adorned with handmade oak doors, lion statues, and is protected by gargoyles.  There is reportedly a spiral staircase in the center that has paintings of medieval knights along its walls, with a treasure chest at the top.  You are supposed to be able to go inside, but frankly the area was just a bit sketchy, and there were absolutely no welcome signs anywhere.  So, we decided not to press our luck, and simply enjoyed it from the outside.  The next castle we visited was the Workhouse Castle (at right, center right).  This was once a prison for petty thieves to work off their fines, then later a poor house, then a city office building.  After its last official use, for a while it became a venue for concerts and weddings, among other events.  Alas, these days it has fallen to disrepair, with lots of inside graffiti and broken glass.  There was an effort in 2015 to restore the building, but it would appear that has yet to be realized.  Sad, as it is a really cool looking building.  Next was a visit to the big green head of Charlie Parker – a famous KC saxophonist and founder of bebop.  He passed away in 1955 and was all but forgotten by his hometown.  But 44 years later in 1999, this giant head was created by the city to give him proper recognition.  Last up was this once vacant lot that was turned into a mini baseball diamond – complete with a fake outfield fence.  Murals along the walls pay tribute to the KC Monarchs – a team part of the Negro Baseball League.

Last up on my KC tour, I visited the National World War I Museum and Memorial.  Wow, was this place impressive!  Reported to have the 2nd largest collection of WWI artifacts in the world.  This place started in 1921 (three years after the end of WWI) with the 217-foot tall tower sporting an eternal flame at its top, with a modest museum at its base.  However, safety concerns shuttered the facility in the 1990s.  Fortunately, KC was not having it, and hired an architect to dig out a big pit under the tower, and reopened a new and much improved museum in 2006.  Inside are hundreds of feet of recreated trenches consistent with that of the war along with cannons, guns, knives, and lots of other time period artifacts.  When entering the museum, you cross a glass bridge looking down over a field of poppies representing the war dead.  Outside, views of the massive tower with an area that overlooks downtown Kansas City are truly exceptional.  This place is a definite must see if you are ever in the area.

Waukee, IA

Just to the west of Des Moines is the town of Waukee – a small town approaching 24,000 residents, that in 2017, was the chosen site for a $1.4B Apple data center (which sadly I didn’t learn about until after I had left – otherwise, I would have tried to get a picture of it).  Also, I was only there for two nights including my travel day, so I really only had one full day to play tourist.  Alas, it rained all that day so I took a break and pretty much hunkered down in the RV and worked a bit on this blog, and also treated myself to an afternoon nap to the sounds of plinking raindrops on the RV roof.  Not a bad way to spend the day!

Eldridge, IA

I continued my Indiana trek eastward along Interstate 80 and arrived in Eldridge.  Here I had booked another 2-night stay, choosing a county park as my temporary residence.  And what a wonderful park this was – several campgrounds within, many having full hook up amenities and large pull thru sites.  Definitely a great place to stay!  Not much to see in this town, but the nearby towns of Davenport and Le Claire had lots to offer.

For any of you who are flea market or yard sale aficionados, and leverage that passion to reality TV, you will certainly recognize the city name of Le Claire, IA as the hometown headquarters and retail store of the famed TV show American Pickers.  I had visited their Nashville Antique Archeology store several years ago, and now with my visit to Le Claire, I have completed my American Pickers bingo card.  Sadly, neither Mike, or Danielle, or Robbie were on hand to meet up with.  But it was fun walking around the store seeing all the overpriced rusty junk – oops I mean antiques having well aged patina.  It was also fun seeing several NFS (not for sale) pieces that were part of Mike’s private collection.  I also recognized the Laurel and Hardy heads from an episode I saw when they picked them.  It truly was a fun stop and now my American Pickers bucket list is complete.

Le Claire sits along the shores of the mighty Mississippi River that also serves as the dividing line between Iowa and Illinois.  It is also the birthplace of the famous soldier, hunter, and eventual showman known as Buffalo Bill.  A stone marker marks the 1846 birthplace of William Frederick Cody, and a museum in town tells his entire life story.  Lots of really cool artifact and memorabilia were housed in the museum.  Also present was the riverboat Lone Star that was in service dredging the Mississippi River and towing the sand carrying barges from the late 1860s until 1967 when the US Coast Guard deemed it unsafe to continue to operate.  It was then dry docked, and in 2009, the Buffalo Bill Museum raised $1M to build a building around it and made it part of the museum.  Lastly in Le Claire I visited the Little Wayside Chapel and one-room Schoolhouse.  The schoolhouse is from 1877, while the chapel was built from a tiny cabin by Cecil Fletcher who was born in 1918 and passed in 2002.  In 2005, a local Eagle Scout took on the project to restore it.  Sadly, when I visited it was padlocked so it doesn’t appear to be much open to the public these days.

Next I ventured to the town of Davenport – a town also on the shores of the Mississippi just west of Le Claire.  With a population of just over 100k, it is the third most populous city in Iowa.  There were a couple of interesting parks with interesting art pieces that were worthy of a visit.  Fist up was a sculpture statue of Abe Lincoln titled “A Little Less Opinion, A Little More Fact”.  This art piece tells the story of the first railroad bridge that crossed the Mississippi, that angered steamboat companies as it threatened their livelihood.  So much so, a steamboat captain rammed and destroyed the bridge.  Lincoln, who at the time was working for the railroad, came down to get the true story of what had happened, and from that secured the continuation of railroad bridge building across the river – including the one that sits behind the statue.  Next I visited Lower Lindsay Park that sits right on the shores of the river and has lots of walking trails and kids climbing things.  It also has this really cool sculpture garden that is comprised of 12 fiberglass people and props that was fashioned from the 1880s painting by Seurat titled “A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte”.  Though I’m certainly not an art connoisseur, I did recognize this art piece (at right, top right), and quickly noticed the similarities with the statue garden.  It was really cool how well they captured the essence of the painting, and represented it in three dimensions.  Pretty cool!

Last up in this edition of the blog was a visit back to the town of Walcott just west on I-80, to a place I had driven by on my way into Eldridge.  Big signs proclaimed this place to be Iowa 80 – the World’s Largest Truck Stop.  So of course I had to check it out.  Featuring 9 restaurants, a convenience store, a barber shop, chiropractor and dentist offices, a movie theater, and workout and laundry facilities to name a few, this 200 acre trucker oasis founded in 1964 welcomes 5,000 customers a day and has parking spaces for 900 tractor-trailers, 250 cars, and 20 buses.  It is literally a town within itself!  The truck stop has been owned and operated by the Moon family since inception, and its founder the late Bill Moon’s collection of antique trucks are now the core of a museum constructed by the Moon family adjacent to the truck stop.  And wow – what a museum!  Well over 100 trucks are featured, several dating back to well over 100 years.  Most beautifully restored and maintained, it was a truckers heaven, and really fun to walk through.

Epilogue

What a difference a day makes!  Pretty much since I left Florida in May, I’ve been dodging storms all along my path.  I’ve certainly had some rain along the way, but thankfully nothing of a serious nature that has been plaguing the Midwest for several weeks now.  I was able to successfully just miss a nasty thunder storm, complete with tornado warnings, that hit the Kansas City area in the afternoon on the day after I had left the area.  Talk about good timing!  Had I been there just one day later, I would certainly have had to take shelter during the tornado warning period.  I certainly don’t want to be in the RV during that type of event.  Often times, campground restrooms and other structural buildings serve as a refuge from tornado activity.  I’ve only been in that situation once during the past 7 plus years of RV travel, and I certainly prefer that it be the last.  It’s definitely not a fun experience, and one that I highly recommend you avoid.  But this time, I was some 200 miles to the north, and luckily managed to totally miss all the really bad stuff.  A bit or rain was all that I got, and that was certainly fine with me.  I’m looking forward to getting out of the Midwest soon, hoping to find some more calm seasonal weather further to the north and out west.  Fingers crossed that I don’t have to deal with dangerous weather during my travels!

Final Thoughts

Well, once again I’ve rambled on creating a rather lengthy blog edition.  But what can I say!  I tend to be wordy, and I’ve had the absolute pleasure of visiting many interesting places during this leg of the trip.  Lastly, I want to thank my sister-in-law Debbie who found and shared this little meme that so accurately depicts the reality of the RVer nomadic lifestyle, and perfectly represents my own personal feelings and thoughts on the subject.  What an absolutely perfect way to describe an absolutely perfect life!  Thanks Deb for sharing!  Well, I’m off to more travel and more explorations as I now begin to head a bit north then westerly towards my ultimate destinations along the west coast.  I’ll no doubt find plenty of interesting places to visit along the way, and look forward to sharing them with you in the coming weeks and months.  Until then, be well and safe travels!

I only show a sampling of my adventure pictures here in the blog, and do so mostly in collage format for brevity and ease of reading. If you want to view an album containing individual full fidelity and hi-res images of all my travel pictures related to this specific blog, click the image below. Enjoy!