East to Glow, West to Snow

Out on the road again, the first encounter with the bizarre occurred just east of Carrollton. It is unlikely we would have even stumbled on that had I not been ignoring the map in favor of memory that turned out not so good.

The original intent had been to pass along US-24, then MO-41 through Arrow Rock.  Instead, we missed the right turn in Richmond and ended staring down the World's Largest Pecan in Brunswick.  We were nearly trapped into shopping too, but it turned out only a momentary distraction.

The opportunity to drop in and have a look at Pinnacle Youth Park, just north of Columbia.  A brief examination of the site found it dryer than had been noted on previous occasions, but no less interesting. 

After lunch, we launched straight into the St Louis area, pausing briefly to check on some family land.  Unfortunately, they had draped so many lights over the area as to make it impossible to view anything beyond the front gate.

That only left our plans for the evening, beginning with the Missouri Botancial Garden, which accessing proved to be an adventure of its very own.  It was not awful and the visit to Garden Glow, quite a fun little experience.  

The next morning ended up in St Charles for their annual Christmas Traditions.  It was kind of half surprise and half "well, of course" and an interesting little experience in the home of the first capital of the state of Missouri.

We had to get out of there fairly early, pausing in Rocheport, just as the sun began to disappear behind the snowstorm clouds that we were headed for in Kansas City.  The day had been near perfect weather, but was about to be ruined, as we finally arrived in town to much higher precipitation levels than had been predicted.