2024 WB Day 5 - Caving In to Cuteness

One of the Challengers needed new feet before we left St Louis, so there was a quick trip into Dobbs Tires to sort that,

Times Beach was the next stop, the now state park, home to an amazing but tragic story of America’s great dioxin disaster.

Remnants of the bridge spanning the Meramec River will soon provide the foundation for a walkway to join the Visitors’ Center to what was once a resort town.

The Sunset Motel built by the Lovelace family in 1947 and then sold in 1971 to the Kruger’s, is still in family ownership.

The original neon is porcelain which requires

polishing (rather than repainting) to show off its best!

Bold hints of our next stop line the roadside.

It was home to Jesse James for a short time but the biggest discovery was the mineral saltpeter (used in gunpowder production) in 1720.

It was 1933 when Les Dill started tying small sign boards to bumpers to cars to give customers a souvenir and the caves free advertising… the fore runner to the humble bumper sticker these days seen on roads all around the world.

Following the flowing freeway, we stop at Fanning at the world’s biggest rocking chair. Why?… why not!

There’s a little fox on hand to provide the day’s cuteness factor...

…before checking out the stories told on walls in the city of murals.

Cuba is one of the best examples of this art form and unlike our own shores, murals remain graffiti free a decade or more on.

The longest continuously operating motel is home…

…dinner is next door at the Missouri Hick BBQ…

…and is finished off with a fire (even on a warm balmy night) to provide atmosphere.