Chuck and Lois's Great Big 6 Year Anniversary Trip Log
Date Notes From Time To Time
Sat Nov 9 Got to Criag's place but no Craig ??? 10:00 AM
Called Craig @ Linda's, surprise, surprise.
Craig back home and we load up for the ride to YVR. 10:45 AM 11:00 AM PST
Checked in, waited for the plane, grabbed a bite. 11:45 AM 12:55 PM PST
And we were off... No harm no foul...
But we forgot to leave Craig the car keys?
Oh well...
Delta #5687 YVR 12:55 PM MSP 6:15 PM CST
Wait for next plane and get more food 6:15 PM 7:15 PM CST
Delta #2317 MSP 7:35 PM STL 8:45 PM CST
More snacks in flight (50 people so we got geat seats next to exit...
what a life :+).  And we got our bags in nothing flat too... 9:00 PM
Caught a shuttle to Drury Inn Airport - St. Louis, MO and checked in... 9:15 PM 9:30 PM CST
https://www.druryhotels.com/propertyoverview.aspx?property=0075
10490 Natural Bridge Road, St. Louis, MO
314-423-7700 
Lois starts looking for Vegiterian places to eat, Chuck builds this  10:30 PM CST
web page (for fun)...
Lois liked the Drury Inn so much she decided that we must do more
U.S. trips where we can stay at these Inns more often... Chuck says 
OK (never argue with the wife ;^)
Date Notes From Time To Time
Sun Nov 10 Everything started out fine today, good breakfast at the Inn, etc. 8:00 AM 9:30 AM CST
Caught the shuttle back to the airport and then the Metro train after 9:30 AM 10:00 AM CST
buying our day passes at $7.50ea... Piece of cake.
Rode the train to Forest Park Metrolink Station and walked to the 10:00 AM 10:30 AM CST
Missouri History Museum (free). 10:30 AM 12:00 PM CST
http://mohistory.org/
http://d.adroll.com/cm/x/out http://www.googleadservices.com/pagead/conversion/1032613984/?label=xorBCMLwnQQQ4OCx7AM&guid=ON&script=0&ord=4083248760638096.5 http://d.adroll.com/cm/g/out?google_nid=adroll http://ib.adnxs.com/seg?add=230913&t=2
5700 Lindell Boulevard, St. Louis, MO
Took in several interesting exhibits (see Monday's log for photos) and then
decided it was too nice a day to ride the shuttle.  Instead we walked through
the park and took a bunch of photos on the way to the...
Saint Louis Art Museum (also free).
http://www.slam.org/
One Fine Arts Dr, St. Louis, MO
We skipped lunch and decided to wait for the park shuttle to get us
to the Science Center next.  However, after a long wait we finally
decided it was not in the cards.  We found out later, after walking
a couple miles to the Planetariuim and Science Center, that the park
shuttle stops running after Halloween (Oct 31).  So, we got more
exercise than we bargained for.  But we finally got there...
Saint Louis Science Center (also free). 2:45 PM 3:30 PM CST
http://www.slsc.org/
5050 Oakland Ave., St. Louis, MO
We found out the Science Center was mostly for kids so decided to
head downtown to see the St. Louis Arch instead.  Rumor had it that
it might rain on Monday anyway and we wanted to get some decent photos.
We walked to the Central West End Metrolink Station and hopped the
train downtown to the Laclede's Landing Metrolink Station just north
of the Gateway Arch Park. 3:30 PM 4:00 PM CST
After taking more photos from outside, we quickly bought some tickets  4:00 PM 5:00 PM CST
to ride 1 of the 8 lifts up to the top were the view was AWESOME thanks 
to the beautiful, sunny day we had at our beck and call (see Monday's log 
for photos).
After that Lois was starving and Chuck was ready to sit down any
chance he could get (sore feet).  So we hopped back on the Metro
and headed west 20 minutes to the Delmar Loop Metrolink Station 5:00 PM 5:30 PM CST
and then walked 6 very long blocks to a Lebanease restaurant named
Ranoush (4.5 stars) which is on Delmar Blvd and is also called the
"Walk of Fame"; apparently because the names of many famous people cast
into stars have been embedded in the sidewalks in that neighborhood.
Delmar Blvd reminded us of Robson Street in Vancouver, BC.
After having a GREAT dinner, we, once again, walked back to the Metro 5:45 PM 7:00 PM CST
and rode the train (along with a bunch of punk kids selling dope to each other) 7:15 PM 8:00 PM CST
back to the Lambert Airport #1 Metrolink Station.  And also, once again, we
caught the shuttle to the motel... happy to be back, safe and sound.
Date Notes From Time To Time
Mon Nov 11 They say a picture speaks 1000 words.  Luckily we have only collected about 8:00 AM 7:30 PM CST
140 photos by the end of day on Monday.  Today we toured most of the
downtown St Louis points of interest and then capped it off with yet
another great meal at The Mango (5 stars) before heading back to the Inn.
To view the day 1 and 2 photos simply click on each of the links below which 
will get you to three photos web pages; one set for Sunday, one set for 
Monday and  one set for extra credit.  They may take a while to load.  Once 
they are done loading just scroll down to view all the photos for each day...
http://cjessup.tmi-america.com/CJessup/CHUCK-LOIS/Nov10-Aniv-Trip-2013.htm
http://cjessup.tmi-america.com/CJessup/CHUCK-LOIS/Nov11-Aniv-Trip-2013.htm
http://cjessup.tmi-america.com/CJessup/CHUCK-LOIS/JPGS/Yr-6-Anniversary-Nov-2013/US-Hist-1801-1900
Date Notes From Time To Time
Tue Nov 12 On Tuesday we visited "The Hill" west of St Louis and got some lunch after 11:00 AM 8:30 PM CST
renting a car near the airport.  Then we headed to Bowling Green, KY.
After a couple wrong turns we finally got there, checked in to the
Drury Inn - Bowling Green, KY and had dinner at the Outback next door.
Lois crashed and burned after planning what we would do on Wednesday.
Date Notes From Time To Time
Wed Nov 13 On Wednesday we visited "Mammoth Cave National Park" north of Bowling  10:00 AM 5:30 PM CST
Green, KY...
http://www.nps.gov/maca/index.htm
Once again a picture speaks 1000 words.  In this case 60 more photos can
be viewed by clicking here...
http://cjessup.tmi-america.com/CJessup/CHUCK-LOIS/Nov13-Aniv-Trip-2013.htm
Date Notes From Time To Time
Thu Nov 14 On Thursday we had a lot of ground to cover so we got moving early that day.  9:00 AM 7:30 PM CST
Once again we headed north of Bowling Green, KY to check out both the 
National Corvette Museum and the Corvette assembly plant tour...  
http://www.corvettemuseum.org
http://www.corvetteassembly.com/Facilities/public/us/en/bowling_green/news.html
Once again a picture speaks 1000 words.  In this case 50 more photos can
be viewed by clicking here...
http://cjessup.tmi-america.com/CJessup/CHUCK-LOIS/Nov14-Aniv-Trip-2013.htm
Note: They do not allow any cameras or video recording inside the plant
during the tour.  Thus no photos of the best part of the day.  But, the tour
was worth the drive to Bowling Green and was quite informative.  And 
GM does, in fact, employ 900 people there along with a large collection
of robots and other interesting technology.
After taking in all the Corvette sights we then drove to Evansville, IL where
we checked into our digs there and changed into better evening attire.  
Then we and went to Biaggi's Ristorante Italiano for our 6th annual
anniversary dinner... 
http://www.biaggis.com
Chuck feasted on LOBSTER CORN CHOWDER and FETTUCCINI WITH LOBSTER
while Lois tried to consume her QUATTRO FORMAGGI TORTELLONI.  We
topped off our meals with PROSECCO, ZONIN, ITALY to lift our spirits and
we split a couple CANNOLI pastery shells and a piece of LEMON TOWER 
CAKE for desert... with coffee of course.  Ummm ummm good as they say.
Date Notes From Time To Time
Fri Nov 15 On Friday we drove the rental car back to St Louis and ditched it by noon,  7:00 AM 7:30 PM PST
hopped the shuttle to the airport and caught our Delta flight back home.
On final approach to Vancouver runway 26 left apparently the weather was
not very cooperative as the pilot abborted the landing and did a go around!
That had to be the only major issue we came across on our entire trip plan.
I guess Chuck should have flown the plane along with driving the rental car?
https://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=49.185133,-123.162242&spn=0.004292,0.010504&t=h&z=17
Thanks to Tom we managed to get back to Craig's place, get the car and
make it over the border to Birch Bay just before the Nexus lane was closed
for the night... we were the last ones through Nexus as it turned out.
Home sweet home again, safe and sound.  Stay tuned for next Nov, 2014.