If you’ve been following our road trip in chronological order, you’ve probably noticed that we crammed A LOT of sightseeing into the trip so far. Due to a planning error on our part, the second half of our trip was filled with many long days of driving and not a lot of sight-seeing. Luckily we learned from this and spaced out the driving more evenly on our next road trip.

Leaving The West Behind

After two very long days of driving, we arrived in downtown St. Louis just in time to stop in the courthouse and grab tickets on the last tram up the Gateway to the West – the St. Louis Arch!

I felt this was an obligatory stop – to symbolize our leaving the west and entering the east. The “world’s largest arch” was completed in 1965, as a monument to the westward expansion of the United States. Little did we know that our visit in October 2015 would have historical significance, as the 50th anniversary of it’s completion!

Unfortunately, the grounds around the arch were all under construction when we arrived. The entire park area under the arch was blocked off and the museum was also closed for renovations. However, all was quickly forgotten as we marveled at the amazing view out the tiny windows– one side from where we came, the west, and the other to where we were going, the east. It was not only symbolic of our journey but also emotional after lots of travel to get here!

We enjoyed about 15 minutes up in the observation area and then boarded the tram for the ride back down the arch. We took a few pictures and then enjoyed a quick dinner downtown before we made our way back to the camper for the evening.

On The Today Show

The next week, I was watching the Today Show one morning and saw that Natalie Morales was at the St. Louis Arch to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the completion. Wow, I thought, we were just there! As the segment began, all of the sudden I saw someone familiar! Hey! That’s me! That’s the kids! And Todd! They filmed us at the top of the arch as part of the segment for the 50th anniversary! Check out the video here. I’m at the 1:00 mark! It was a great surprise at the end of our long trip.