Day 2 - Southwest National Parks Adventure

9/25/2025

Neither aliens, creepy children or dead baseball players emerged from the cornfield next to our camping spot. We had a quiet, although rainy, night and were on the road again a little before9:00. It was still cloudy and a bit rainy in the morning, but cleared up by noon and was a beautiful day. The views from the freeway are not great in this part of the country. Lots of large storage facilities and big box stores. Our first frolicking detour was a walk around St. Charles historic district near Saint Louis. We stopped in an old building to discover it was the original  Missouri capital.

We had a late lunch in St. Charles and continued west. Our bike ride for the day was a section of the Katy Trail. We’ve ridden sections of this trail before on a trip to Saint Louis. It is the country’s longest continuous recreational rail trail at 240 miles. This afternoon we covered 11 miles of it. We parked at the Katy Trail - Rocheport Trailhead. We rode west for 2.5 miles. On our right were stone cliffs and on our left the river bottoms. The river was not visible from this area of the trail, it was, however, a popular area for butterflies. They fluttered around us as we pedaled by.  We rode through a stone tunnel originally cut through a hill for the trains. We turned and rode back past the parking lot and the camper to check out the east bound section of the trail. The cliffs still hung above us, now on the left, but on the right we had spectacular views of the mighty Missouri River. Great trail, and well worth the two days of less than spectacular highway views.

Arby’s for dinner and a night in a Big Bass Pro shop parking lot. You might be wondering why we don’t go to campground? We have discovered that when traveling cross country and stopping after dark for a single night, it is easier not to try and pull into a dark campground. We will be staying in campground once we get “out west”.