Drumroll Please....

I know that you have all been waiting with baited breath to hear more about Road Trip 09, so hear you go...the play by play for Springfield, MO.

Our hotel was a "vintage motor court" on Route 66. It was actually quite nice, and the lobby and outside was really cool 1950's looking. They even had old phone booths and cars in the parking lot. The room was a wonderful set up. It had a kingsized bed in the main room, and a little room with a futon/bunk bed and its own tv. Both tvs had dvd players, so this was the ideal set up for us.

We met up with Rick and had a late lunch/early dinner at Logan's. From there we went to Bass Pro...the main store which looks like it could eat the Macon store for a snack. It was 3 levels, and there were all kinds of water features and aquariums and wildlife mounts. Quite a bit of it was being remodeled, so it wasn't as good as it could be, but it was still really neat. They had race car simulators you could drive, and Paige was all about that...until we watched someone else do it, and she realized she'd get car sick. It was pretty intense. There was a restaurant with a gorgeous salt water aquarium behind the bar, and a "fine gun room" with guns upwards of $35,000. I'm happy to say that we left Bass Pro without buying anything. I didn't take my camera inside...didn't realize you would need a camera at Bass Pro...so I don't have anything but cell phone pics from there, but it was really neat...and I'm not really a Bass Pro person so that's saying a lot.

After there, we went to Rick's daughter's house and visited for a little while, then went to the hotel to watch Gilmore Girls. We took a break to go to Andy's Frozen Custard and are now custard fans. Sunday, we went to church at a humongous church with Rick. The pastor there will be doing the sermon at the Souther Baptist Convention this year, and the choir will be performing there as well. I feel famous, now. After church, we had lunch at Rick's daughters, then the guys went to play golf and Paige and I went to the mall. I saw a mall cop on a segway (sp?) and it was the highlight of my day! We had barbeque that night for dinner...and more frozen custard.

Monday, we went to Wilson's Creek Battlefield, a Civil War battlefield. Frank LOVED it. I was happy Frank enjoyed it so much. You drove from site to site, and could hike and see more, but it was very muggy, and I was sweating like a pig just getting out of the truck, so we didn't hike. After driving through it, we went to the museum, and it was full of all kinds of neat things. Again, Frank really enjoyed it, and we were very patient and let him look as long as he wanted (it was air conditioned in there, which really helps with my patience.) Here are some pics from the battlefield...you couldn't have flash photography in the museum, so I didn't take any pics inside.

Frank read every word of every sign they had.

This is the house that was used as a hospital. It was way up a hill, and you can't go inside, so I just took a pic with the zoom on. Notice the artsy layout....on Jacob's camera, if you are outside, you can't see what you are taking a picture of, so I had to guess I had it aimed right....this pic, not so right.
Down from the house/hospital was the springhouse.

Like I said, Frank read every word of every sign.

They had cannons in several places...the kids liked that.

This was a really pretty place, I just wish it hadn't been so unbearably humid. I took some pretty flower pictures, but I'll save them for another post. (You know, so I can drag this out.)

After the battlefield, we saw Rick one more time to say goodbye, and headed to St. Louis. Tune in tomorrow for the next installment in the saga that is...Road Trip 09!