Printer Friendly Version

DAY 5 – Thursday, March 18
START: Clarkesville, TN
END: Troy, IL
MILEAGE: 350 miles

HIGHLIGHTS: Land Between the Lakes; sketchy BBQ

From a purely road trip perspective, I was extremely proud of us today.  After Nashville, our next “scheduled” destination wasn’t until Kansas.  I figured we’d just make a beeline through the southern half of Missouri until we got there.  It was Lauren who suggested, “Hey, it’s only a couple hundred miles north of here.  Why don’t we head up to Saint Louis and see the Arch?”  Eh…  I honestly wasn’t too revved up about visiting the Arch for reasons I’ll explain later, but I figured, why not.  When else would we be this close to it after all?

So we plotted our route on the spot.  I ran my finger along the map and saw something promising.  A road marked by green dots, indicating a scenic route, passing between two bodies of water, called “The Land Between the Lakes.”    Perfect.  That was what this road trip was all about.  Not knowing where we’d go or what we’d see on any given day, and not marking out a set route in advance.  I had been worried that we didn’t have it in us, and that no matter how much we tried to fight it we were people who needed too much structure to our plans.  This day proved that we had that vagabond spirit inside us.

The Land Between the Lakes National Recreation Area is an inland peninsula, the largest of its kind in the United States, which runs between Kentucky Lake and Lake Barkley, spanning the Tennessee/Kentucky border.  It is the focal point of the entire region’s $600million tourism industry.  The road traversing the peninsula is called “The Trace.”  Lauren and I took our time passing through.  The temperature was a warm sixty degrees – not bad for the middle of March – and we drove with the windows down, listening to all the CD’s we’d bought the day before.  We’d stocked up on peanut butter, jelly and bread in the morning so we pulled over a couple times to make sandwiches.  PB&J – another great road trip meal.  Here and there we stopped to take a picture next to one of the many natural and historical attractions along the way and even paid the three-dollar fee to drive around the Elk and Bison Prairie. 

We learned that “prairie” really was a relative term these days.  Back in the days of the Native American Indians, this whole area was nothing but grassland.  Every year, the Indians would burn the fields, eliminating overgrowth and attracting grazing herds to the area.  When the white man came along, they ignored the advice of these “uncivilized” people and the area soon became almost completely overgrown with small trees, brush and hardwood forests.  Much of the game the Indians hunted moved on to other areas.

Whenever there wasn’t much in the way of scenery, or whenever we ran out of things to talk about, Lauren and I pulled out our collection of Mad Libs.  These were another gift from Chris and Susan.  When I first saw them, I was like, “Okay, interesting,” all the while thinking that as an adult, I’d find Mad Libs kind of boring.  But let me tell you, they were a blast.  It’s amazing how much fun Mad Libs can be when you have two people of relatively acute intelligence throwing answers back and forth.  We had the most fun trying to think outside the box with “adverbs” and “parts of the body”, because just ending words with “ly” got boring and honestly, how many fun body parts does anybody have?  We found ourselves laughing out loud at phrases like, “Shake the bottle LIKE A RETARD and pour the contents over YOUR BIG FAT ASS.”   

We crossed into Illinois and made our way along the western border toward St. Louis, passing through Chester, Illinois, which according to the sign at the edge of town is the “Home of Popeye.”  More accurately, it’s the hometown of Popeye creator, Elzie Crisler Seger.  Apparently there was a statue of the famous one-eyed sailor in the middle of town, but we didn’t stop to look. 

It was nighttime by the time we approached St. Louis.  We decided to do the Arch first thing in the morning, but would head into the city for dinner.  ROADFOOD refers to C&K Barbeque in St. Louis as “a small, out-of-the-way place.”  What it should have said was, “a small place IN THE GHETTO!”  It was getting on past eight o’clock by the time we got lost looking for C&K and we were immediately struck by thoughts of, “Oh god, this is not a good place to get lost.”  You know that ominous feeling you get in certain areas of certain cities – not a lot of street lights, boarded-up buildings here and there, even most of the houses have no lights on inside.  When we finally found the restaurant and placed our order, there was no public bathroom, so we walked across the street to a gas station sporting the thickest bulletproof glass I’ve ever seen.  And yes, I’ll be honest – the fact that Lauren and I were the only two white people (with Jersey plates) in a neighborhood that required bulletproof glass only increased our unease. 

When our order was ready, we paid for it and made straight for the interstate.  Our plan was to head back into Illinois and find a hotel for the night.  We had to drive for over an hour before we found a hotel whose lobby was bulletproof-free.  Later on, when we recounted our nighttime St. Louis experience to others, they all said, “Oh yeah, St. Louis is an incredibly dangerous city.”  Great, thanks ROADFOOD.  Our stomachs were growling and we couldn’t wait to dig into that barbeque.  When we finally found a safe-looking Super 8, we went straight to our room.  We didn’t even bring our bags in, just tore into our food.  And man was it disappointing.  I suppose most any barbeque would be disappointing after eating at Ridgewood in Tennessee, but the ribs were nothing more than a lot of tough, overcooked fat, and the sauce was that flavorless paste I spoke of earlier. 

I ended up going to a Taco Bell across the street.

ONTO DAY 6