Hannibal and Saint Louis

After a quiet evening in Topeka, I headed off into Missouri. My first target was Hannibal, which is best known for being the childhood home of Mark Twain. It's a sleepy town, which, as of this writing, is probably mildly worried about flooding.

The main items of interest to Twain-o-philes are the museum, which includes several buildings having some relevance to Twain, especially as viewed through the lens of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and some caves, which would be familiar to readers of that work. I went to the museum but not the caves, and enjoyed strolling around the small riverfront area.

I spent the night at Mark Twain State Park, which is on Mark Twain Lake, right near the hamlet of Florida, which is where Samuel Clemens was born. The house he was born in is preserved in a chapel-like museum in the park.

From there I drove down to Saint Louis, where the extent of my sightseeing was a visit to the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial, best known for being home to the Gateway Arch.

OK, a bit touristy, but I needed a break before driving on to Kentucky.