Travel Archives

November 10, 2014

Burr Oak Lodge

As you’ve read before, my lodging needs are pretty simple: I look for a clean, cheap room with a decent bed, fast internet connection and a good shower. Even some of those things are negotiable.

I usually stay in the second-cheapest motel in Athens, Ohio. So far as I know, they haven’t let a body go undiscovered for long periods of time, like the CHEAPEST place, which carries the local nickname of The Meth Motel.

No room at the Inn

This trip, however, everything for 30 miles around Athens had been booked because it was Fathers Weekend at Ohio University. Curator Jessica, as a last resort, called the Burr Oak Lodge , a place I thought would be too expensive. It turned out they had ONE room left, and it qualified for “Savvy Senior” pricing for the weeknights.

The only catch is that it is north of Glouster, about 30 minutes out of Athens over some of the hilliest, curviest roads (when they say 15 mph, they mean it) you’ll ever see. By the time I got to the Burr Oak Lodge because of circumstances I may write about later, it was well after midnight and all I wanted to do was collapse. I DID snap this shot of the front of the building, however,

Wow, this is NICE

Since I usually spend all my time sleeping, editing or roaming around, I hardly ever check out the surroundings of the places I stay. I don’t use their gyms, swimming pools or business centers.

Sunday morning, though, I thought I’d stroll through the lounge area of the lodge. I HAD noticed that the large fireplace had openings on both sides and that people were sitting in a sunken area chatting in front of the blaze.

Great view of Burr Oak Lake

There is an outdoor walkway off the lounge that puts you into the treetops where you can commune with birds and look out over Burr Oak Lake.

Overlooking the overlook

There is a balcony overlooking the lounge area that has its own fireplace, game tables and lots of comfortable seating. As you can see, the lounge is comfortable enough that a guest is napping on a couch.

If I can convince Wife Lila to come to Athens with me, this would be a perfect place for her to sit and quilt while I’m roaming around the countryside.

The lodge has a restaurant, but I discovered a diner about five minutes away that has good home cooking, big portions and small prices. It’s friendly enough that the second time I came in, the waitress brought my iced tea the way I like it without being asked.

“Mommy, what is Bambi doing?”

Cabins are also available. They’re full of deer hunters right now. In fact, one of them had two deer hanging on the front porch. That might be hard to explain to your kids: “Mommy, what is Bambi doing hanging from a rope on that porch?”

This odyssey is coming to a close. After a lunch meeting on Monday, I’m pointing the van south to head to family and warm weather.

November 7, 2014

Johnson’s Shut-ins 2014

I’m pretty sure the last time I was at Johnson’s Shut-Ins State Park in Reynolds county to take photos was around 1978. Even though the pictures are old, the post still gets lots of hits. There must be a lot of interest in the park.

Photo gallery of Johnson’s Shut-Ins

You can go to my earlier post to read some of my recollections of going to the park when I was a kid, and you can go to the state’s website for official information. Click on any photo to make it larger, then use your arrow keys to move through the gallery.

November 6, 2014

St. Louis City Museum

Kid Matt, Sarah and Malcolm made a trek to the St. Louis City Museum when they were in MO in the summer of 2013. He had the advantage of having a young kid along who would try anything, as these photos will prove.

Curator Jessica and I got to the joint just before closing on a chilly, rainy afternoon, and she didn’t even want to ride the Ferris wheel on the building’s roof.

She kept muttering something like “You’re standing on a banana peel on the steps to eternity, but I’ve got a lot of life left, and I don’t intend to die on a Ferris wheel in St. Louis.”

Everybody was friendly

When we pulled into the parking lot, the attendant said, “We’re going to close in an hour, so I’m not going to charge you for parking.” That earned him one of Miz Jessica’s super-fine homemade-and-carried-from-Ohio cookies.

The same thing happened at the admission desk. Instead of paying $17 for museum and rooftop access, we were only charged $8. All of the workers we met were friendly and helpful.

I got her on the Ferris wheel

With a lot of pressure and a fair amount of shaming, I got Miz Cautious Curator on the Ferris wheel. In return, she made me hop into the dark hole that was a 10-story spiral slide. I didn’t have time to get claustrophobic, but I did get slightly concerned when the rubber soles of my shoes caused me to hang up on some of the tight turns. I wish I had asked earlier how they flush the tunnel of stopped-up slidees.

City Museum photo gallery

Here is a sample of what we were able to see in about an hour. We didn’t spend any time in the museum proper. Your kids will love this place. Click on any photo to make it larger, then use your arrow keys to mover through the gallery. Go to the City Museum website for more information.

November 3, 2014April 2, 2021

Licking the Arkansas Arch

When Curator Jessica made her initial pilgrimage from Ohio to Missouri last December, I convinced her that every first-time visitor to St. Louis’ Gateway Arch has to lick the stainless steel icon.

She was a mere child of 29 at that time, and gullible.

Not falling for it at the state line

When I asked David Kelley of Steele, Mo., if the old concrete arch over U.S. 61 at the Missouri – Arkansas border was still standing, he said, “Yep. It’s still there. It’s only eight miles away, let’s go see it, then go down to the Dixie Pig in Blytheville for lunch.”

U.S. Route 61 is the official designation for the highway that runs from New Orleans, past Memphis, past Cape Girardeau and St. Louis, ending up in Wyoming, Minn.This section through Arkansas was once a dirt trail called the North-South Road, and was in such poor shape that it might take as much as a full day to cover 15 miles.

Highway 61 called the Great River Road because it parallels the Mississippi River a good part of its run. It also answers to the name “Blues Highway” because of the path it takes through Blues country.

Now that she’s put 30 birthday candles in her back pocket and done several thousand Steinhoff Road Miles, Curator Jessica is older and wiser. She wasn’t falling for the old Lick the Arch trick twice. She did agree to risk death by posing under the arch so you could get an idea of its scale, roughly 15 feet high and 20 feet wide at the base.

Almost a lick

I didn’t realize until I was editing the photos that she DID fake an almost-lick for the camera. I guess that’s close enough.

The arch was created by the Mississippi County Road Improvement District in 1924. Check out what the National Registry of Historic Places says about the arch and what Arkansas highways were like in the first quarter of the 20th Century. It’s a fun read and will make you appreciate modern roadways.

I love this part: The location of the arch on the directly south of the Arkansas-Missouri state lines had a somewhat strange economic effect. Highway 61 runs primarily north to south, but at the state line the road runs east to west for a distance of approximately one-half of a mile. The state line is located directly north of the section of highway.

A lower gasoline and cigarette tax in Missouri led to a concentration of businesses on the north side of the highway. At one time there were as many as fourteen service stations lined up along the “line”. Along with the service stations came several nightclubs and small gambling houses. The area around the arch became known as “Little Chicago” because of the type of activity that went on there. A long-time resident of nearby Yarbo, Arkansas, once said of the arch, “It was a good place to go while the wife and kids were in church.”

Click on the photos to make them larger.