Friday in St. Louis
Oct. 20th, 2012 12:09 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
draggonlaadyFirst stop this morning was Park Avenue Coffee for a mocha (for me), hot chocolate (for Bruce) and gooey butter cake (for both of us). Well, actually, I guess first stop was the Unique Thrift Store on the way to Park Avenue, to pick up a couple wind breakers, because the weather has been rather less balmy than was predicted when we were packing. THEN on to enjoy the delicious gooey-ness. And delicious it was.
After breakfast, we took the train to the Science Center and Planetarium. We caught a Planetarium show about Edwin Hubble and the Hubble Telescope, then wandered through the rest of the planetarium and science center looking at the exhibits. Lots of interactive stuff; this place would be a paradise for kids interested in learning. I was sad that we missed the "Born to be Wild" Imax show. They kicked us out at 4:30 when they closed... time flies when you're on vacation.
We caught the train back to town for dinner at Bailey's Range - apparently, Mr. Bailey has our number. This restaurant is owned by the same guy that runs the Chocolate Bar and Rooster. We definitely gave a disproportionate amount of our spending this week to him! I guess I am okay with supporting him though; the food at all 3 places was very enjoyable, and I was sorely tempted to order the "LGBT" burger (see menu) just on principle. In the end though, I was unable to resist the call of the ABC. Lucky had the American, because hey-mac&cheese! We also got billy goat chips, which are a locally-made potato chip with Parmesan cheese, and cheese paddles, which are Mozarella sticks on growth hormones and steroids. Seriously, the order is 2 sticks, which are probably called paddles because they're nearly large enough to row a boat with. We barely finished 1 of them between the 2 of us. Bring friends if you decide to go for these, you'll need the help! Milkshakes were delicious - salted caramel for Bruce, chocolate and salted caramel for me. Really, there was so much promising stuff on this menu that we had trouble choosing. I am also firmly in favor now of apples on burgers!
After dinner, we walked over to St. Louis' City Museum. The Museum is usually only open until 5, but stays up until midnight on Friday. We did the aquarium first - a very cool space with lots of interesting animals and information, but I think some of the tanks could have been better set up, both for visibility and for space for the inhabitants. The gennets were only visible via mirror, because the cage was so high that you couldn't see directly into it. Speaking of gennets - this aquarium had a LOT of land animals for an aquarium... Not that that's a problem, really, but I was rather surprised by the number of snakes and etc. We got pictures to make kresentiam jealous of the coatimundi cage. The kinkajou and sloth were adorable, and since we didn't get to see those at the zoo, it was nice to see them here. There were many warnings on various enclosures about inappropriate pets; as with the St. Louis children's zoo, a lot of these animals were released by private owners when they became too large or complicated to keep.
Then we left the aquarium for the Museum proper. We headed up to the roof, which is an open-air space of slides and crazy metal structures to climb and explore. There is a school bus driving off the side of the roof, and a giant preying mantis statue as well as a ferris wheel (because just being on the roof of an 11 story building isn't high enough!). There are stairs to get to most places, but not all - there are are metal frames for scaling up to everywhere, and we did a lot of climbing throughout the evening. The indoors of the Museum had almost nothing you'd typically associate with a museum. There was one hall of skeletons and diagrams, and a bunch of architectural examples and statuary. Then there was a hall of old arcade and fair-way stuff, which was pretty cool. The rest of the museum is basically the best jungle gym ever. There is a giant habitrail in the ceiling, a twisty tree house to climb, tunnels and caves with hidey-holes and crawl spaces with grotesques carved into the walls and sometimes actually forming tunnels, so that you crawl down the throat of a dragon. We spent a couple hours playing in the caves and then took a break for dessert.
Back to Gelato Tavolini, which is a conveniently short walk from the museum. Bruce had the butterscotch pecan this time, and I went for coconut and chocolate again. The chocolate was noticeably more bitter this time, so there is apparently some variation between batches.
After gelato, we headed back to the City Museum for "lights out"; at 10 PM on Friday, they turn all the lights out and let people play in the dark for 2 hours. This made a disappointingly small difference in the caves, but the rest of the place was made more fun by the additional challenge to exploration. We stayed until closing; crawling and climbing and shuffling through small spaces. A really entertaining full body work out.
We caught the last bus home, always a concerning situation of "hope we don't miss it!" Bitchy bus driver was driving again - she was letting people on the bus this time, but standing in the aisle talking on her cell phone again the whole time, except when she was arguing with riders. Couldn't even bother to hang up her phone to talk to riders! Bruce was approached by a guy while digging through his satchel for his bus pass - guy shoved a couple transfer forms into his hands and said he could get free rides using them. Bitch driver yelled out the door at Bruce "you can't use those! You shouldn't have taken them!" And then goes back to complaining loudly into her phone. After we were on and seated, a guy tried to board with a pass from the train and she told him he couldn't because it was the wrong pass (weirdly, if you buy a one-way pass, you cannot use it on the bus, but if you buy a two-hour pass, <i>for the same cost</i>, you can - but nowhere that we could find is that posted; we got caught by it on our way to Aftershocks last week), and he didn't have cash. So after several minutes of her refusing to let him on the bus (remember, this is the last bus of the night - he can't just go buy a new pass and catch the next one), Bruce got up and handed him cash to buy a ticket. At which bitch driver tells the guy he can get on and give Bruce his money back, because "he don't need to be in our business"... the same business she'd been loudly arguing in the aisle where every rider on the bus could hear it, as well as whoever the hell was on the other end of her cell phone that she STILL had not hung up.
I guess 2 rude people in the entire time were were there isn't bad, but given how nice everybody else we met/talked to was, it's a sharp contrast to deal with people like her and the Millennium shuttle driver.
After breakfast, we took the train to the Science Center and Planetarium. We caught a Planetarium show about Edwin Hubble and the Hubble Telescope, then wandered through the rest of the planetarium and science center looking at the exhibits. Lots of interactive stuff; this place would be a paradise for kids interested in learning. I was sad that we missed the "Born to be Wild" Imax show. They kicked us out at 4:30 when they closed... time flies when you're on vacation.
We caught the train back to town for dinner at Bailey's Range - apparently, Mr. Bailey has our number. This restaurant is owned by the same guy that runs the Chocolate Bar and Rooster. We definitely gave a disproportionate amount of our spending this week to him! I guess I am okay with supporting him though; the food at all 3 places was very enjoyable, and I was sorely tempted to order the "LGBT" burger (see menu) just on principle. In the end though, I was unable to resist the call of the ABC. Lucky had the American, because hey-mac&cheese! We also got billy goat chips, which are a locally-made potato chip with Parmesan cheese, and cheese paddles, which are Mozarella sticks on growth hormones and steroids. Seriously, the order is 2 sticks, which are probably called paddles because they're nearly large enough to row a boat with. We barely finished 1 of them between the 2 of us. Bring friends if you decide to go for these, you'll need the help! Milkshakes were delicious - salted caramel for Bruce, chocolate and salted caramel for me. Really, there was so much promising stuff on this menu that we had trouble choosing. I am also firmly in favor now of apples on burgers!
After dinner, we walked over to St. Louis' City Museum. The Museum is usually only open until 5, but stays up until midnight on Friday. We did the aquarium first - a very cool space with lots of interesting animals and information, but I think some of the tanks could have been better set up, both for visibility and for space for the inhabitants. The gennets were only visible via mirror, because the cage was so high that you couldn't see directly into it. Speaking of gennets - this aquarium had a LOT of land animals for an aquarium... Not that that's a problem, really, but I was rather surprised by the number of snakes and etc. We got pictures to make kresentiam jealous of the coatimundi cage. The kinkajou and sloth were adorable, and since we didn't get to see those at the zoo, it was nice to see them here. There were many warnings on various enclosures about inappropriate pets; as with the St. Louis children's zoo, a lot of these animals were released by private owners when they became too large or complicated to keep.
Then we left the aquarium for the Museum proper. We headed up to the roof, which is an open-air space of slides and crazy metal structures to climb and explore. There is a school bus driving off the side of the roof, and a giant preying mantis statue as well as a ferris wheel (because just being on the roof of an 11 story building isn't high enough!). There are stairs to get to most places, but not all - there are are metal frames for scaling up to everywhere, and we did a lot of climbing throughout the evening. The indoors of the Museum had almost nothing you'd typically associate with a museum. There was one hall of skeletons and diagrams, and a bunch of architectural examples and statuary. Then there was a hall of old arcade and fair-way stuff, which was pretty cool. The rest of the museum is basically the best jungle gym ever. There is a giant habitrail in the ceiling, a twisty tree house to climb, tunnels and caves with hidey-holes and crawl spaces with grotesques carved into the walls and sometimes actually forming tunnels, so that you crawl down the throat of a dragon. We spent a couple hours playing in the caves and then took a break for dessert.
Back to Gelato Tavolini, which is a conveniently short walk from the museum. Bruce had the butterscotch pecan this time, and I went for coconut and chocolate again. The chocolate was noticeably more bitter this time, so there is apparently some variation between batches.
After gelato, we headed back to the City Museum for "lights out"; at 10 PM on Friday, they turn all the lights out and let people play in the dark for 2 hours. This made a disappointingly small difference in the caves, but the rest of the place was made more fun by the additional challenge to exploration. We stayed until closing; crawling and climbing and shuffling through small spaces. A really entertaining full body work out.
We caught the last bus home, always a concerning situation of "hope we don't miss it!" Bitchy bus driver was driving again - she was letting people on the bus this time, but standing in the aisle talking on her cell phone again the whole time, except when she was arguing with riders. Couldn't even bother to hang up her phone to talk to riders! Bruce was approached by a guy while digging through his satchel for his bus pass - guy shoved a couple transfer forms into his hands and said he could get free rides using them. Bitch driver yelled out the door at Bruce "you can't use those! You shouldn't have taken them!" And then goes back to complaining loudly into her phone. After we were on and seated, a guy tried to board with a pass from the train and she told him he couldn't because it was the wrong pass (weirdly, if you buy a one-way pass, you cannot use it on the bus, but if you buy a two-hour pass, <i>for the same cost</i>, you can - but nowhere that we could find is that posted; we got caught by it on our way to Aftershocks last week), and he didn't have cash. So after several minutes of her refusing to let him on the bus (remember, this is the last bus of the night - he can't just go buy a new pass and catch the next one), Bruce got up and handed him cash to buy a ticket. At which bitch driver tells the guy he can get on and give Bruce his money back, because "he don't need to be in our business"... the same business she'd been loudly arguing in the aisle where every rider on the bus could hear it, as well as whoever the hell was on the other end of her cell phone that she STILL had not hung up.
I guess 2 rude people in the entire time were were there isn't bad, but given how nice everybody else we met/talked to was, it's a sharp contrast to deal with people like her and the Millennium shuttle driver.
