Springs in the Fall

Friday, October 29, 2021

After leaving our AirBnb condo in Branson, my sister headed home to St. Louis. Taking the most direct route, her drive was about 4 hours long. Bob and I also headed to St. Louis, taking a route that would have us on the road for two days. No...we didn't get lost, but instead were on a nostalgic pilgrimage to revisit some special places from our childhoods.

Bob's grandmother (Granny to him) lived in the "boot heel" of Missouri so he has many special memories of times spent at her house and the surrounding area. I grew up in Southern Illinois and my family often took camping trips throughout Missouri when I was young. Between the two of us, we had mapped out a route to visit some of the places that we remembered from years gone by. Interestingly enough, many of these spots were springs located in the Ozark National Scenic Riverways (hence the title of this post!)

Roads through southern Missouri are scenic but the hills and curves are not conducive to quick travels. Google Maps was our navigation guide, but we found that it didn't always give us the best advice on routes. This wasn't too much of a concern since we weren't under any time constraints. We just went with the flow and enjoyed the journey.

Back roads of Missouri.

Our first stop was at Alley Mill located west of Eminence, Missouri.. The mill was built in 1894 to grind grain into flour and was powered by water rushing out of Alley Springs. The day was cool but comfortable enough to hike the 1.7 mile loop trail that went around the springs, passed by a small waterfall and followed along the river. (Pardon the abundance of photos. I read that Alley Mill is one of the most photographed in the world and it is easy to see why!)

Bridge crossing over the river to the mill.

The spring with its dark turquoise water.

Bob had fun crawling through the small caves in the bluffs along the trail.

Crossing back over the stream at the end of the trail.

Just north of the town of Eminence was our next stop, Round Spring, one of Missouri's first state parks in 1932. No one else was around as we walked the short trail to the spring. 

From the National Park Service website:  The spring itself is some 55 feet deep, rising in a nearly circular pool of water before flowing under a natural bridge to join the Current River. On an average day, some 26 million gallons of water flow from the spring. At quiet times, otters, wood ducks, and great blue herons may be seen in the spring.

Round Spring

To complete our "spring day in the fall", we drove to Big Spring near the town of Van Buren. The name is not very creative, but it is accurate. Big Spring is one of the largest (if not THE largest) in the United States. Enough water flows out of the spring to fill Busch Stadium in St. Louis in just a little over a day! No hike is needed to see this spring, it is visible from the parking area and comes bubbling up out of the base of a limestone bluff. 

From the National Park website:  At an average daily flow of 286 MILLION gallons of water, Big Spring is an awesome sight and a geologic wonder. Underground passages carry water from as far as 45 miles away to emerge at the spring. Studies have shown that the water is carrying a load of dissolved limestone equivalent to 70 tons a day! This dissolved rock gives the spring its color and is also carving out a huge conduit underground. Should the spring ever go dry, a huge cave will be the result.

Exploring the bluffs above the spring.

Our day ended in the town of Poplar Bluff. It was getting dark as we pulled into the Fairfield Inn and Suites and we were hungry. Our Covid comfort level hasn't gotten to the point where we want to eat at an indoor restaurant yet. (Nor did we feel like getting cleaned up after our day of hiking and rummaging through the woods.) An Imo's Pizza was located adjacent to the gas station next door so we gave them a call. My sister loves Imo's but it was new to us. We walked over to pick up our pizza and brought it back to enjoy in our room. We both gave it a thumbs up!

Convenient after a day of exploring...Imo's Pizza right next door to our hotel!

Our room had one of the best hotel showers I have encountered and it felt wonderful. A little TV and then off to bed. Tomorrow...another day full of memories!

Road-Tripping to Branson

October 25 - November 6, 2021 (Part 1)

A couple of years ago, as we were anticipating Bob's retirement, I was mentally planning several big bucket list trips. I had actually gotten so far as to book a 28-day cruise to the South Pacific for February 2020 and a land tour of Turkey for May 2020. And beyond that I was dreaming of traveling to all seven continents. After all, our 2019 cruise to South America and Antarctica had given us a great start on this goal.

Well, it wasn't meant to be. We cancelled the South Pacific cruise before final payment. Something just didn't feel right about the trip. Perhaps I had a premonition of what was coming? And by the time we were to have been in Turkey the whole world had shut down. As many others, I assumed the "pandemic pause" would be over in a few weeks and then we would continue on with our travel dreams.

Now, nearly two years later, the ability to travel is slowly returning, but not even close to what I would consider "normal". So instead of writing posts about our international adventures, I am using this blog to write about our close-to-home jaunts. Perhaps these travels aren't exciting or interesting to others, but they still fall under the category of our "souvenir memories" and as such, I will record them. Lord willing, I will be able to look back on these times in the future and say "remember when we had that pandemic..."

With our Black Hills trip in the rearview mirror, we decided to squeeze in one more fall trip. One advantage to living in a large country, such as the U.S., is that the seasons do not change simultaneously in all locations. Our timing had been good to catch fall colors in the Black Hills in late September but by traveling south in late October we could once again catch the beautiful autumn foliage.

Our two weeks in Missouri was a combination of tourist sites, nostalgia, and family time so rather than give a day-by-day account, I will do the condensed version covering some of the highlights.

Touristy stuff first...

Hot Springs, South Dakota

 Friday, October 1, 2021

Our last day in the Black Hills...and a day with no plans.

The morning view from our deck.

Armed with lots of Black Hills tourist brochures and a map we decided over breakfast that we would head south....to the town of Hot Springs. Because we were in no hurry, we chose to take the longer route going and make the return trip a little more direct.

In our new car (which technically is two years old but seems new since we have done very little traveling during the pandemic!) the first thing I always do is connect my iPhone. The car is equipped with Apple CarPlay and it is nice to be able to use Google Maps and some of the other apps on my phone via the screen on the dash. BUT...connecting my phone did nothing. I fiddled and fiddled but the car and my phone just weren't going to play nice.

I finally had Bob pull over, turn off the car and then restart it. This procedure usually yields pretty good results when I have issues with my home computer, but in this case...nothing. My consensus was that the iPhone cable must have gone bad so I gave up. Using Google Maps was still possible on the phone, it just meant Bob no longer had the larger screen map to follow. 

Fossils don't rank very high on my list of things to see when we travel, but Bob thought it would be interesting to visit the the Mammoth Site in Hot Springs. The active paleontological dig site has the largest concentration of mammoth remains in the world and also fossils of other Ice Age animals such as camel, llama, giant short-faced bear, wolf, and coyote.

The Lows and Highs of our Day in the Black Hills

Thursday, September 30, 2021

With our last visit only a year ago AND extending our trip a few days this year we were able to be more relaxed and not feel the pressure to be on the go all of the time. Today I gave myself permission to not set an alarm and have a more leisurely morning enjoying my coffee. Bob (as usual) decided the morning gave him the time to hike up the hill by our cabin. On his hike he had a "small world" moment when he ran into a couple who had originally lived not too far from our home but retired and bought the house right across the road from the AirBnB where we were staying. (Stay tuned for an even "smaller world" moment coming up tomorrow!)

There were no concrete plans today so after a bit of a discussion, we decided to drive into Wind Cave National Park. Our AirBnB is right on the border of the park so we had been on the back roads on our wildlife quest but had not yet entered the park "officially". This time we went through at the park entrance, but used our America the Beautiful pass so there was no fee. 

From our son's experience and reading reviews online, I knew taking a cave tour meant showing up at the crack of dawn to get a ticket. So when we stopped at the visitor center at 10:40 am we expected to just go through quickly and look at the exhibits. Besides, taking a cave tour with a group of people was exactly the opposite of what I wanted to be doing in a pandemic.

BUT...as we entered I heard the guy behind the counter saying that they still had a couple of tickets left for the 11 am tour. A little voice in one ear was saying "no way...why would you want to be in such a confined place with a bunch of strangers!" while the other ear was hearing "go for it...you know how much Bob loves caves!" 

Long Lost Memories in Custer State Park

 Wednesday, September 29, 2021

What a difference a day makes! Yesterday's blue skies and warm temps were gone and we woke up to a windy overcast day with highs only in the mid-50's. Definitely a jeans and jacket sort of day.

The goal for the day was to explore in Custer State Park, specifically Needles Highway and a couple of other spots that our son had suggested after their recent Black Hills trip. 

Going north on route 385 provides a pretty good view of the Crazy Horse Monument. Visiting the monument was on our tentative itinerary but we never made it so I was glad I took some photos as we were driving past. (Something to look forward to on a future visit!) I was using a pretty long zoom, but the highway view isn't too bad even with the naked eye.

The large truck parked on the arm gives some perspective on just how huge this sculpture is!