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Published: July 22nd 2009
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We have really hopped around and covered miles the last three days. Before leaving Springfield, MO we ate our last breakfast there at Mudhouse---a local favorite and then toured Fantastic Caverns for my second time and we had to eat at Andy's Frozen Custard one last time again before we left---nothing like it!
We traveled on 255N over the Mississippi River AGAIN and stopped in St. Louis to touch the GI-NORMOUS St. Louis Arch. It was 76 degrees and cooler. Then we crossed the Mississippi again into Illinois. We ate dinner at the Ariston Cafe, the oldest existing restaurant on Route 66 and quite a little gem...the best liver and onions I have ever had and even the kid loved the liver! The elderly guy who runs it inherited it from his grandparents (about a century old) and lots of famous stars stop there. We stayed in Litchfield, Illinois, a little historic farming town a few blocks away.
The next day (yesterday) we left Litchfield and passed a sign on the interstate (I-72) that said "90 degrees Longitude, 1/4 way around the world"---I beg to differ---it feels like we have now circumvented at least twice!!! We drove through gorgeous
farmland and corn and soybeans as far as the eye could see for over 100 miles---it was quite a sight, passing through little farm towns like Jacksonville and Virginia on Routes 125 and N78. We arrived in Macomb, my college town I have always wanted to see since I graduated from Western Illinois University, Macomb but had never set foot there. What a great town! It reminds me of Chico, CA decades ago---a quaint little college farming city, population 20,000. It exceeded my expecations and I am so glad I graduated from such a neat place. Everyone was SO friendly throughout the town too!
We stopped at the Alumni House and the kind folks there lavished us with expensive gifts like fancy $50 shirts, mugs, license plate frames, and souvenirs. Then we spent about 2 hours touring the beautiful historic 150 year old campus. I loved the clock tower on campus when it chimed---reminded me of Pacific grove, CA growing up---same sound. We ate dinner at Chick's the cool happening college-y place to eat and then checked into the wonderful Pineapple Inn Bed and Breakfast in Macomb. I loved sitting on the porch at dusk watching the cardinals and
Looking up at the Arch
That thing is so big it makes you dizzy to look up at it! robins and fireflies! One of the highlights of the entire trip----sitting and doing nothing for an entire hour. Wow, what a novel concept. We stayed in the FAITH room---not the HOPE, CHARITY, or LOVE rooms. I slept my first 8 hours in weeks and like a log. It rained all night and ALL day today too.
We left Macomb, 63 degrees and rain---it was oddly 63 degrees ALL day everywhere we went today. We drove through Good Hope, population 400---quaint and beautiful farming towns with corn as far as you could see----people definitely would get killed and lost in those fields going for miles and miles and miles.....very wild! We drove through Roseville, Illinois---that is...on the Ronald Reagan Trail through Galesburg (Carl Sandburg's birthplace), we took US 67N, US 34E, I-74, and past Reagan's birthplace off of I-80E (just like at home)...we stopped to look at a fabric and quilter's store in Princeton (cannot sling a dead rat without hitting a quilting store around there), we took I-39N, US 20W, IL 2, I 39N and crossed into Wisconsin, taking I-90W to stay in Sparta, WI.
Been thinking about road signs, particularly the ones in KY, TN, and even
I love WIU
My college! MO and IL that say, DO NOT MOW on the Interstate medians---are they really afraid folks will get up early on a Sat. morning and go mow the interstate? Also the ones that say REMOVE ACCIDENT VEHICLES IF NO INJURIES---think about that one---it confuses me???? Is this to say that they are worried that you will have enough strength to remove your vehicle if you're injured? I'm confused---guess I am just tired from driving?
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