Today’s throwback is to some photos I found from a Troop Court of Honor in July 2007. I noticed a few fun things here.
And here are a few more photos from this Troop Court of Honor.
Troop Court of Honor – July 2007
The Husband
Trip to the Top of the Gateway Arch at Night
I finally went through my footage of our trip to the Gateway Arch from Thanksgiving and I put together some highlights in this video.
It was a somewhat rainy day, but we still had some amazing views of downtown St. Louis from the top. This is the first time I have been up in the Arch at night and it did not disappoint.
We pre-purchased our tickets online. When we arrived, we went through the security checkpoint pretty quickly. So then we had time to tour the museum. Since the Gateway Arch is a memorial for St. Louis’ role as the “Gateway to the West”, a lot of the museum is about the westward expansion. There are some really nice dioramas of the Mississippi riverfront as it appeared in the past. There are also a lot of displays about the people who were heading west from St. Louis to start new lives on the frontier and the types of things they took with them. There is also a significant section dedicated to Native Americans and how the drive west impacted them and how they were forced to migrate to reservations.
When it was time to board, we waiting in line for our boarding passes. Since there are six in the family and only five seats per tram, we had to split up. The Husband and I went in one tram (which we shared with a very nice young couple), and the boys went in another. While waiting to proceed to the tram loading area, there was a movie to watch with lots of cultural references from 1965, the year the Gateway Arch was built. At the tram loading area, there were more video presentations about the building of the arch which we watched while we waited for the trams to arrive.
Once the trams came and the people who had ridden them down stepped out, we were able to board. The trams are very small and not for the claustrophobic. You can see this in the video. My favorite part of the tram ride is seeing what is inside the legs of the arch. There are stairs and workbenches and all sorts of mechanical stuff. It is really fascinating to me.
Once at the top, we waited our turn for an open window. First we were able to view out of the east side, seeing the Mississippi River and Illinois. Then we viewed the west side and saw downtown St. Louis. The view was spectacular! The video doesn’t really do it justice, but you will get the idea.
When we were ready to leave, we asked for boarding passes for the trip down. We didn’t have to wait long for a tram and took the ride back down, which is slightly faster because of gravity. 🙂
We toured some parts of the museum we didn’t have time to see before our tram ride. Then we left and went back out into the rain. It was a very fun family adventure.
Christmas with the Family
One of the best things about Christmas is having everyone home. The fun, the dinners together, the board games. And the boys all together again.
The boys tend to be last minute Christmas shoppers. But they always come up with great gifts. This year, when L opened his present from Z, it was a very colorful Christmas blazer. D said something like, “I’m going to have to borrow that.” But then J handed D a present from him and -guest what – it was the same jacket! Great minds think alike. Now the two of them are thinking about all of the different events they can wear these very classy jackets to. This goes well beyond the normal ugly Christmas sweater.
Merry Christmas from our family to yours!
Rock Hollow Golf Club – Harvest Hosts Review
Our first stop on our recent trip to Holland Michigan was at the Rock Hollow Golf Club in Peru, Indiana. This was about a 5 1/2 hour drive from St. Louis. It took a little longer for us to get there though because we had a problem with the bike rack on the bumper of the Micro Minnie Winnie and we had to stop and move the bikes to the bed of the truck. Read more about our bumper bike rack issue.
This was our first time staying at a Harvest Hosts site. We were really relieved to find out how easy it was. We parked on the edge of the parking lot and checked in with the golf course staff. They told us we could just stay put where we had parked.
Since we arrived late in the afternoon, we got a bucket of balls and practiced at the driving range. Then, after the golf course closed and everyone had left, we rode our bikes on the golf cart paths and checked out the course. That was really fun.
In the morning we had an 8am tee time. We played 9 holes. I just took up golf a couple of months ago and The Husband hasn’t played since college, so we are not very good. 🙂 But we had fun on this course. The greens were well maintained. The scenery along the course is pretty and we even saw a swan in one of the natural areas.
After our round of golf we left and headed for Holland, Michigan.
