Road Trip!

I'm back from my little break.  We took a little road trip to St Charles, Missouri (just outside St Louis) for Bob's nephews wedding.  It's about a 7 hour drive from West Michigan if you don't stop.  We went with Bob's brother Tom and wife Bonnie, and his brother Larry.  Larry's wife Lynn couldn't come because she had prior plans for a little trip with her sister who lives in Montana.

Here we all are on the road; Tom and Bonnie in the front, then Bob and I, and Larry took the back.

It was fun watching the scenery gradually change.  Michigan is pretty black and white yet, with very little green on the trees.  As we drove it got greener, trees were flowering and we saw a lot of fields with these purple wildflowers.  In Missouri, the tulips were almost done blooming!

I don't remember where this was, but this enormous cross was a neat thing to see along the road.

Here we are crossing the Mississippi river!

Shortly after crossing the river we got caught in a traffic standstill.  It was caused by this 3 car accident, with a car in the middle that was pretty damaged.

 This is the Missouri river.  There were 2 of these little buildings in the middle of the river.  We couldn't figure out their purpose or how anyone would get into them.

We made it!  We had such a nice hotel room.  It was a suite, with a sitting area, which is nice when you are spending more than one night there.

 Bob's brother Tom had spent quite a bit of time in the area for work and knew some good places to go while there.  One of them was the Sugar Fire restaurant.  They specialize in BBQ, and it was so good! The BBQ sauce with tape on it says Dragons Breath.

 When we left the restaurant, these bikes were in the parking lot.  It looked like they had just taken part in a funeral.  We thought the helmet with the blood type on it was interesting.

 We also went to Fast Lane.  It's a place that specializes in old cars.  They have several buildings full of cars, motorcycles, bikes and other memorabilia.  It was very interesting to walk around and look at everything.

 Here's Larry, Bob and Tom in front of the cars.
I don't want to overwhelm you with pictures, so will share more tomorrow.