This morning we had some adventures in downtown St. Louis.  Adam and Heidi and the kids took us to the St. Louis Arch.

From my journal:

We had an appointment at the Arch Museum at about 11:00.  First we went to watch a 20 min. documentary film about how they built the Arch.  The monument is a symbol of the role STL played in western expansion during the 1800s.  The Arch is 630 feet tall and 630 feet wide.  The Arch is designed to withstand earthquakes and lightening strikes and designed to sway up to 18″ in a 150 mph wind.  There are 1,076 steps in each arch leg.  On a clear day visitors can see up to 30 miles.  Construction began on 12 Feb 1963 and completed on 28 Oct 1965.

We walked through the museum and looked at the covered wagon and the handcart.  We looked at a teepee and Indian things.  We learned more about the Arch and we waited for our 1:00 ticket time to go up in the Arch.  We rode up in small elevators that held 5 people.  By now Adam had joined us from work.  Margot said the ride was kind of scary because she thought we were going to go upside down.  Clark worried that we would run out of air.  Josie worried that we’d get stuck or locked in the little elevator cars.  There there was no way to look out as we went up, but when we got to the top, we got out of the cars and looked out some small windows.

We saw STL down below and the Mississippi. The windows up there were small. We got to stay up on top for about 8-10 minutes. A second set of elevator cars came up the other leg of the Arch. It took about 4-5 minutes to go up and about 3 to come down.

We spent a little more time in the Museum after that. We watched a 3D virtual history about the docks at STL in the early 1900s for about 10 min. Then we left the Museum and walked down to the water where the river boats docked. Our tickets included a 1 hour boat ride up and down the Mississippi. The chairs on the 3 decks quickly filled, so we sat inside and listened to the captain tell us things about the history of STL. It was interesting but the kids were more fun. Mark Twain’s town is about 160 miles upriver from where we were.

We know the kids are excited to move to Utah, but they are also sad to leave this place.  They have loved it here and they’ve made so many good friends.  They will make good friends wherever they go.