Dr. Edmund A. Babler Memorial State Park, Wildwood, Missouri
There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under heaven. ~ Ecclesiastes 3:1
We were up and out early today because it was scheduled to be yet another long day sightseeing around St. Louis; this time at Forest Park. On June 24, 1876, Forest Park officially opened to the public, and an estimated 50,000 people showed up! At 1,371 acres, it exceeds New York’s Central Park by more than 500 acres.
It includes all kinds of free stuff to do. And I do mean all kinds! And! It’s all free!! With the exception of a few special exhibits and possibly some concerts.
- Missouri History Museum – done
- Saint Louis Art Museum – today
- Saint Louis Zoo – today
- The Muny (outdoor musical theatre)
- Saint Louis Science Center & James S. McDonnell Planetarium – planned on it, but ran out of time
- Shakespeare Festival St. Louis
- 8 dining establishments
- Cabanne House – again, ran out of time (first brick farmhouse west of the Mississippi, 1819)
- Dennsi & Judith Jones Visitor & Education Center – open for restrooms only
- The Jewel Box – today
- World’s Fair Pavilion – today
- Flegel Falls – today (75’ waterfall known as the Cascades built in the 1930s with federal funding. Named for the World’s Fair Cascades that ran down Art Hill during the fair.) We saw it, but didn’t stop to take a picture. No parking available.
- John F. Kennedy Memorial Forest (hiking trails)
- Nature Reserve Prairie, Savanna & Wetlands (preserved natural areas)
- Pagoda Circle/Nathan Frank Bandstand – today
- Athletic Fields for model airplane flying, soccer and cricket
- Bike tours & rentals
- Bird watching
- Boating
- Two golf courses
- Two tennis centers
- Fishing (with a license)
- Handball & racquetball courts
- Picnic areas
- Sledding (in season of course)
- Stand up paddleboarding
- Steinberg skating rink
- And 20+ statues scattered around the park
Wow! We couldn’t do all these things if we had a month here!
Before we went to the park, we had to stop at the Missouri Baking Company and pick up our peach cobbler. And since we just happened to be there, we might as well pick up another chocolate drop and try a cannoli, right? We’ve had cannolis in the past and weren’t all that impressed, but we figured this legitimate Italian bakery would be the ultimate test. We’re still not impressed. But that’s okay. We don’t have to love every single high calorie thing we put in our mouths. The cookie, was saved until after dinner.
Oh my goodness, was it delicious!
We tried a little bite after lunch, and had to force ourselves to stop eating it. lol
Our first stop in Forest Park was the Zoo. You have to pay $15 to park at the free zoo, unless you arrive early enough to find a place in the street, which we did! We really didn’t know what to expect from a free zoo, but this place was waaaay more than what we thought! There were lots of different animals and their areas were good sized, for the most part. The pathways were well marked and shady. We didn’t take a lot of animal pictures because . . . well . . . we just didn’t feel the need. Save on film and all that, right? Wait. What?? Actually, we just didn’t see the need to show you pictures of every single thing in a zoo, even though we spent two hours there. You can find much, much better pictures and videos elsewhere. And it saves me a lot of time when preparing the blog. So basically, after all the pictures we took yesterday, I’m just being lazy. Sorry to disappoint. Lol
Anyway, we’ve never seen an eagle like this!
I found some better pictures on-line so you can appreciate yet another aspect of God’s spectacular creation!
And stunningly gorgeous!
After an early lunch sitting in the Jeep, we left the Jeep right where it was and took a fairly long walk to the free St. Louis Art Museum. The original building was built in 1904 for the World’s Fair, the addition, in 2000. It’s ginormous! And has three floors of art to look at! All types of art, from all over the world. We spent another two hours here.
We didn’t get to see it until we were ready to go back to the Jeep.
Also, we didn’t take this picture like we meant to, because we were too in awe of it, I guess.
I borrowed this one from someone online.
I thought this sculpture created in 2006, warranted a little research. This is what I found on the Zoo’s website:
It’s 130 feet long, 36 feet tall and weighs over 107 tons—all Cor-Ten or weathering steel. The steel is formulated to oxidize a thin, almost chocolate brown coating that stabilizes over time, protecting the steel beneath better than painted steel. The massive piece came to town on 15 flat bed trucks. The largest sculpture at any public zoo in the United States, Animals Always features over 60 animals peeking out from behind sculpted trees, ferns and other plant life. The sculptor, Albert Paley, conceived the idea of this steel menagerie more than two years before he met St. Louisan Thelma Zalk, who with the Shankman family made this piece of public art possible. Paley worked closely with Zoo staff to represent animals that are featured at the Saint Louis Zoo. Many of the animals, fish and plant life depicted are also endangered, so this piece helps inspire future generations to protect our natural world.
It’s called the 1904 Flight Cage, and it’s now part of the zoo, with guess what?
Ducks and some birds. : )
The streets were lined with parked cars, for what seemed like miles, but none of the rest of our stops today were within walking distance, so we vacated our spot, and hoped to find others wherever we headed.
Map in hand, we drove through the Park. Our next stop was at The Jewel Box. It’s sort of a greenhouse, with cantilevered, vertical glass walls that are 50’ high. It opened in 1936. The inside was closed by the time we arrived (they close early on Saturdays, which seemed strange to us), but the grounds were beautiful. We took a peek inside, and while we were expecting to see lots of gorgeous flowers and plants in there, there were just some green things, like palm trees, etc. At any rate, we didn’t feel like we missed anything by not getting there sooner.
Isn’t it pretty?
At some point, we found another place to park and walked around to some of these various venues, but I can’t remember where we parked, and where we walked. I just know it was better than driving everywhere, because as you’ll see in one picture, cars were lining the streets everywhere! I guess it’s good the park gets used so much.
We drove on around the road and stopped at the Pagoda. The island in the center of Pagoda Lake was the site of the Park’s first bandstand beginning in 1876. The original was deemed unsafe and closed in 1911. Then it was damaged beyond repair by a storm and the wreckage was burned, then torn completely down in 1912. It was replaced by the Nathan Frank Bandstand in 1925. According to the Forest Park website, they still hosts bands there – or at least they did before COVID put a stop to everything.
Not far from there, was the World’s Fair Pavilion. It was built in 1909 with proceeds from the World’s Fair, which apparently is very unique, because as a rule, World’s Fairs don’t make any money at all. In fact, they cost the host cities a ton of money. This pavilion is used for wedding picture taking, or can be rented for various activities.
We stayed out of their way. : )
It was a gorgeous day, in an amazing park! Every large city should aspire to something like this! Especially the free museums and zoo, so everyone, regardless of their income, can come in and experience culture.
But we were tired, and still had a stop to make outside the park – the Cathedral Basilica of St. Louis. When we first spied it from the street, it reminded us of the St. Joseph’s Oratory we visited in Montreal last year. Not nearly as large, but the look and shape of it. It was just as incredible-looking, if not more so, because much of the inside of this Basilica appeared to have gold leaf decorating it, making it look like fairies blew glitter all over the place. In this case, all that glitters truly is gold! Sort of. With some help from the 41.5 million pieces of tile that cover 83,000 square feet – in more than 7,000 colors! It is the largest mosaic collection in the world, outside of Russia. The building’s ground-breaking was in 1907 and it took 80 years to complete the church. They began placing the tiles in 1912, and finished in 1988. In 1914 dollars, it cost $3,000,000 to construct. That’s equivalent to roughly $77,000,000 today. And as far as I could discover, there’s no gold leafing. Just tiles. They have a museum and offer tours, but by the time we arrived, all that was closed. Too bad. I’ll bet it would’ve been super interesting!
As we were leaving, police cars began arriving. They were there for calling hours for an officer who was shot a couple of days ago. ☹
Remember the old Alka-Seltzer commercial, I can’t believe I ate the whooooole thing . . . ??
Well, that was us at dinner tonight! We stopped for dinner at another aunt and uncle recommendation – Guido’s – and ordered a deluxe pizza. But to be fair, it was a really thin, crispy crust, so it was pretty easy. 😊
They have several cheese options for your pizza, mozzarella (of course), cheddar, provel, or mixed. Silly us; we though the provel was provolone, so when our waiter asked; rattling off the types of cheese; we thought mixed cheese sounded pretty good.
The pizza looked pretty good, and smelled even better, but when we served it up, the cheese was sort of pouring off it, as you can see.
It also had a taste we couldn’t quite identify. So when we left, we looked up that provel cheese. Here’s what we learned – – Provel is a white processed cheese product particularly popular in St. Louis cuisine, that is a combination of cheddar, Swiss, and provolone cheeses. Provel has a low melting point, and therefore has a gooey and almost buttery texture at room temperature. It is the traditional topping for St. Louis-style pizza.
I think it was the Swiss that was throwing us off a bit.
Another exceptional day (especially the eating part!) in St. Louis, Missouri, and all thanks to the list provided us by Uncle Nick and Aunt Sherri!