You Have Died of Diphtheria!

Here is my fearless travel companion, in all its glory. You'll note how low it is sitting in the back. That is due to the weight of all of my stuff. I have a lot of books. The books themselves are not heavy in the philosophical sense. But all that paper makes for a lot of weight.

Guess where I am now?! Topeka! Topeka, Kansas! I have traveled 1032 miles so far. Man! That is a lot of road. (Speaking of roads, I'd like to give a general message to the state of Missouri: FIX YOUR FREAKING ROADS!!!) Today, I added Missouri and Kansas to the states I've been in - the states have gotten considerably larger, sadly, so there will be fewer 'yay! I'm in new state!' moments.

Only about 2050 miles left...

I'm not feeling the words tonight, so I'll just try to post some pictures of my morning in St. Louis. I went into St Louis in the morning, and stayed doing touristy things through lunch, then drive to Topeka.



It's the arch! That's how you know for sure that I was really in St. Louis. For $10 you can get a ticket to get a tram ride to the top of the 630 foot arch. Also for $10 you can get an hour long 'cruise' on the Mississippi River in an old Sternwheeler type boat. I chose the boat. I've been 630 feet up before. Higher, even. (I've also been on a boat before, but not in St. Louis) This picture has the old Courthouse under the arch. They built it in the 1830s-1860s. Remember the famous Dred Scott case? (me either) Dred Scott, and his wife, both slaves, sued for freedom after they were moved from a free state to Missouri, a slave state. They lost.



I love this building so much, that I'm going to build a replica of it on my Greek island some day. I'll have a big sign on the outside that says "Orphanage" and inside will be the coolest playground/rollercoaster ever. What it is in real life is an old electric company - built in 1902 to power the 1904 World's Fair.


The Gateway arch was finished in 1965. It was built to celebrate or commemorate or something-ate America's expansion west of the Mississippi. Seeing as St. Louis was the gateway city and all. Three of the main Trails of the Oregon Trail started in St. Louis.


One of the other main jumping off points for the Oregon Trail was Independence, Missouri. I decided that I should check out their historic area as well, seeing as it was on the way to Topeka. Independence, MO in modern days is like a ghost town. Everything is boarded up, and the roads are even worse than the bad Missouri roads. I guess it makes sense that the town that grew up around people trying to get as far away as possible would eventually fade away. The most interesting thing I found in the historic district (I kept getting lost and couldn't find things!) was this old log courthouse from 1827.

I have bunches of more pictures on Kodak Gallery if you are interested.

I'll stop my history lesson now!

More road beckons for tomorrow...