Day 11-June 11, 2015-Hannibal, MO
Drove 188 miles in 6-3/4 hours. Cloudy, 85-92, humid, down to 65 by 9PM
We decided we’ve had enough of big cities and interstates for a few days. After we got out of St. Louis on I-70 we headed north on highway 61. Highway 61 is a nice, 4 lane road with no stop lights, 65 mph speed limit and pretty yellow and pink wildflowers in the median. The road is smoother than the interstate, less trucks and traffic and more scenic. We drove through farms and little towns like Troy and Bowling Green to Hannibal, Mo on the Mississippi River.
Hannibal is where Sam Clemens, aka Mark Twain grew up and the town that inspired Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn. We parked at the Mark Twain Riverboat and walked a few blocks through town to the historic section where there is the Clemens home, the famous white picket fence, Becky Thatcher’s home, a Mark Twain museum and other historic landmarks. At the foot of Lover’s Leap is a life size sculpture of Tom & Huck, dated 1926 and the first public American sculpture depicting fictional characters. A woman took our picture at the statue and talked us into having lunch at Finn’s, her restaurant. We had toasted ravioli, which we learned about in St. Louis. Seems the chef made a mistake and toasted the ravioli instead of boiling it. Or so the story goes. Had a shrimp po boy, too big to eat the whole thing, and Harry had a catfish sandwich.
Back on the road, this time west on highway 36, which we found out goes 3564 miles across the country from New York to San Francisco and is known as the Pike’s Peak Ocean to Ocean Highway or the Appian Way of the US. Nice road, similar to 61, much easier to drive than the interstates. Stopped for the night in Bevier, MO. As soon as we pulled in the site-thunder, lightning and a downpour for about 5 minutes, than the sun came out. After dinner we walked down to the small restaurant on the property, more like a bar with some food. We got talking to the owner and during the hour or so we were there the temperature dropped about 25 degrees and it got windy. They said a big storm was coming and we were under a tornado warning. They said if things got bad to come back down because the safest place was in their walk-in cooler and there was so much beer in there we wouldn’t care what happened.