Father Daughter Trip - Kaitee

Becki uploaded the pictures for this post over a year ago. I forgot about it...I really don't touch the blog, I've only posted a handful of times since we started it. Recently I saw the "draft" with the pictures and realized that more than a year has passed by without writing anything!

 

It's well past time that I finish this blog post...better late than never, right?

 

Mid-July 2016, I mentioned to Becki that I wanted to start a tradition of taking each of the kids, one-on-one, on a short 3-4 day trip, between their 8th and 9th grade years in school.

 

The trip would be tailored to each kid, in regards to destinations -- however, the point of the trip wouldn't necessarily be where we went, but it would be doing things together, making memories, and deep talks about life -- reinforcing what has already been taught/told them, while diving deeper at the same time.

 

Having brought this up to Becki in mid-July, with summers as busy are our summers are, I was expecting that she would inform me that we didn't have any open weekends that I could take Kaitee anywhere. To my surprise, and delight, Becki said that we had the weekend before my birthday open.
 

Kaitee was easy to plan "where to go" for. With her interests in reading, and admiration of Amelia Earhart, I knew exactly where I wanted to take her...But, I kept out destinations to myself, in order to see her reaction when I would reveal where we were.
 

I also made a bullet point chart of all the topics I wanted to talk about. Ranging the gamut of life issues...yeah, pretty much everything you can imagine.

 

Day One -- August 11, 2016: Hannibal & St Louis, Missouri

We headed out. We only got 20 minutes south of home, and I decided to make an unexpected stop.
 

Kaitee's Great-Grandfather, Warren L. Huff, was Killed In Action (KIA) in Germany during World War II. I thought this would be a good place to start, though we've both been here before, I wanted to really bring "the price of Freedom" home to her...her Great Grandfather died for it and we would never know him because of it.
 

As I shared about Warren (and the price of Freedom), Kaitee knelt down, cleared some grass clippings from the top of the headstone and listened. It was a really sweet moment, and a great way to start our trip.

 

We had finished  Our Final Looking For Lincoln Adventure just a few weeks before Kate's and my trip. However, there were a handful of L4L Plaques that we couldn't locate along the way. We contacted the administrators after our final trip about the ones we couldn't find. Turns out some have moved. Here's one we missed in Quincy, Illinois as a family.

From Quincy, IL, it was a short drive to our first planned stop: Hannibal, Missouri. It was along the shores of the Mississippi, in Hannibal, that Samuel Clemens aka Mark Twain, grew up. First stop in Hannibal was Riverview Park. This park has some fantastic vistas of the Mighty Mississippi.







From Riverside Park, we drove into town and went to the Boyhood Home & Museum of Mark Twain. They've done a great job of making Mark Twain's home accessible to tourists. We enjoyed our walk through, and read every sign...though, one of the highlights for both of us was the air conditioning vent that blew cold air into the gift shop! A modern convenience, for sure, but it was a super hot day when we were there.



The obligatory white-washing the fence picture.

We loved the gift shop for the cold a/c and fun hats.

One of Kaitee's favorite things in the house, were Twain's old books and eye glasses.

Across the street from Mark Twain's home, is the Becky Thatcher house.

Kaitee in front of the Tom Sawyer & Huckleberry Finn statue.

Mark Twain statue along the Mississippi River.

We continued south to St Louis, the final city on our itinerary for the day. Along the drive from Hannibal to St Louis, Kaitee and I enjoyed each other's company...and goofed off a bit.

 We laughed at every selfie we took (yup, I'm driving)

Slap-happiness set in, we saw this, and had to turn around to get a picture of it.

We stopped by Forest Park, in St Louis, for a brief time. The sun was getting low on the horizon, and cast a golden hue over the planetarium.

Forest Park, has a little bit of everything.

After Forest Park, we stopped by Fitz's -- a unique restaurant, built around a root beer bottling company, for a late night dinner. After dinner we started heading towards a friend's house for the night...shortly after heading west, I realized that we had not seen The Arch at all. We came down on Highway 61 from the North, not from Illinois from the East. So, we didn't see it. Well, this was unacceptable. I wanted to at least see The Arch with Kaitee, even if it was 10 in the evening.

 

Wouldn't you know it, the whole area around The Arch was under construction. We drove around, missed exits, were diverted in the wrong direction. We circled around a lot longer than I would like to admit, given the time of evening. Finally, I found a small parking lot near a church...this would have to do. I took another 5 minutes to find a setting on the camera that would take a decent night shot of Kaitee and The Arch, with the lovely construction fencing between them. At least we got to see it, and made more memories along the way.

After the Arch, we drove west to our friend's house for the night. Day one was in the books. We had a couple of good conversations already, had seen the boyhood home of a famous author, had lots of laughs and made delightful memories. I couldn't wait to unveil what I had planned for the rest of the trip to Kaitee.

Day Two -- August 12, 2016: Mansfield, MO & Eureka Springs, AR

I had a few definitive destinations in mind for our second day out. Though we had been to Mansfield, Missouri before, it had been 6 years, and it fell in line with the literary theme of the trip. Mansfield is where Laura Ingalls Wilder lived and wrote the Little House on the Prairie books.

After I took the picture below, Kaitee told me that she would like me to be in some of the pictures with her. I had brought the tripod with us for that very purpose. I apologized and told her that for the most part, I don't even think of it, and asked that she remind me at future photo-ops and I would be happy to join her.

 

This is the new museum, built since we last visited.

Kaitee with Pa's fiddle.

Laura & Almonzo's grave with trinkets left by visitors.

I had told Kaitee about the College of the Ozarks a couple of years before. They have a program where you work off your tuition as you attend, so that you would graduate debt free, without student loans. She has expressed interest in finding out more about the College of the Ozarks...and wouldn't you know it, it wasn't terribly far from where we were going to be on this trip.

Heavy rain made the driving interesting from Mansfield, passed Springfield, and tapered off by the time we got to the College of the Ozarks. This was a surprise for Kaitee, and we enjoyed driving around campus.

"Dad, remember what you said about taking our picture together?" Out came the tripod.

Unbeknownst to Becki, I had done a little research and found Eureka Springs, Arkansas had a lot to see...Eureka Springs would add hours to our already long day. But it was only a couple of inches from Springfield, MO on the map!! The Arkansas border was only a few miles further down the road from the College of the Ozarks, so why the heck not? Arkansas, here we come!!


Façade of the Walls of Jerusalem at The Great Passion Play.



The Jesus statue was under repair when we got there.

Sunset on the drive back up to Springfield.



I had wanted to get back to Springfield in time to eat at Lambert's, famous for their throwed rolls...yeah, they literally throw them to you at your table. I was worried they would be closed by the time we pulled up, turns out Eureka Springs was further than I thought it would be, especially given the curve-y two lane roads to and from. We pulled up to Lambert's, excited to see their lights on and cars in the parking lot. We were bummed when we found out that they lock their doors at 9:00 -- we got there about half an hour after that. :-(

 

We ended up eating at a Steak n Shake after 10:00 pm.

  

Day Three -- August 13, 2016: Atchison, Kansas

 

I had plans of an early morning start the next day, but weighed what I wanted to do against how tired we were after the long day we had had, I was leaning on sleeping in instead. I looked up to see when Lambert's opened, as it was an experience I wanted to share with Kate...we would sleep in and eat at Lambert's for an early lunch. 

 

After eating, we headed north to our next destination, Atchison, Kansas. This was another easy one to surprise Kaitee with. She has been enamored with Amelia Earhart since she was very young. So, in planning this trip, a stop to the home of one of Kaitee's role models was an easy decision to make.

 

Amelia Earhart was born in the home of her grandparents on the banks of the Missouri River. It is a magnificent, stately, home and managed by the Ninety-Nines, an organization of woman pilots started by Amelia. We enjoyed chatting with a couple of the 99s who were at the home that day, who told us stories of Amelia and the home.

 

We took our time walking through each room. There were displays, pictures, memorabilia, documents, etc for us to enjoy . . .                                                      

 

After seeing a roller coaster at a State Fair, Amelia built a wooden coaster of her own. Her grandmother took one look at it and had it taken down. Kaitee was beside herself when we walked around the exterior of the home and stumbled across this little replica in the flower garden.

After we were done at the home/museum of Amelia Earhart, we asked one of the Ninety-Nines for recommendations about other attractions in town. She recommended us go down to the old Train Depot, that was now a museum as well as the Amelia Earhart earthworks.

Display of Amelia, at the Old Train Depot.



Below is the best picture I could get of the Amelia Earhart Earthworks. Made up of rocks and different types of vegetation, it makes up a portrait image of Amelia. Kaitee and I recommend the city of Atchison build a viewing tower.

Here is a good overhead look at her profile at the Earthworks - borrowed from the web. 

We left Kansas heading north to Nebraska. We spent the night with some friends in the Southeast corner of Nebraska. This would be the final night of our trip, and we enjoyed visiting and chatting with our friends.

Day Four -- August 14, 2016: Pella, Iowa and the Drive Home

After a fantastic homemade breakfast, we hit the road home. I opted for a more scenic drive along the southern tier of Iowa Counties.

More Selfies were taken.

The day was beautiful. The blue sky had enough puffy white clouds to give it character, but not too many to block out the sun. On one particular intersection of two gravel roads, I pulled over and got the tripod out to capture the beauty of the moment.

We drove into Pella, Iowa. The town was mostly deserted, we parked the car and walked around and enjoyed several of the cool things the town has to offer.

There's even a canal that goes through town . . .

. . . and a draw bridge

We're pretty much the selfie experts.

After we left Pella, we drove north to I-80 and headed home. A couple of last minute, spontaneous stops...we pulled off at the Ladora exit. That's the home town of Mildred Augustine Wirt Benson aka Carolyn Keene. Mildred wrote most of the early Nancy Drew books. Though this kept with one of the themes of our trip, there is pretty much nothing in the town of Ladora significant to Mildred/Carolyn Keene or Nancy Drew.

 

Next, and final, spontaneous stop of the trip was to Atalissa, Iowa. I've driven through Atalissa numerous times for work, and their "Welcome" sign always gave me a chuckle, "Pop. 271 & 2 Grumps." I set up the tripod for a final picture of the two of us acting "grumpy." This was easier said than done, I set the camera to snap off 10 pictures . . . it took us 3 attempts (30 pictures in all), to get one of us looking kind of grumpy. The fact we were off the side of the main road through town, and had cars driving by us just made us laugh.

As it turns out, it was a fitting end to our trip. There was plenty of laughter, lots of talks, lots of memories made. I love you Kaitee, and I will cherish the memories of this trip forever.