My husband participated in the Parks Tae Kwon Do Midwest Open Championship in Chesterfield, MO. He did very well and had a good time. Here are a few pictures of the Demonstration and tournament:
After the tournament we found lunch at
Crazy Bowls & Wraps, a fast
food chain that serves stir fries, salads, and wraps with fresh ingredients. It was really good and we commented it would be nice to have them around us for a tasty but healthier alternative.
We then had a couple of hours to spend at the
Missouri Botanical Garden. As a member of our local botanical gardens, it was nice this garden had reciprocity with ours. The garden is huge and quite impressive. There is a large Japanese garden, a garden dedicated to irises, woodland gardens, rock gardens, German gardens, Bavarian gardens, herb gardens, etc.
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| Tulip Tree (see next photo for flowers) |
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| Maze |
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| Bavarian Garden |
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| They had koi food that people were feeding these koi, although the ducks managed to snatch quite a bit of the food. |
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| These heads of lettuce were huge! |
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| I've never seen swiss chard, kale, and other greens this huge! |
There are also are several buildings including Henry Shaw’s country house (Tower Grove House) built in 1849. One neat aspect of this house is that it told the stories of several of his loyal servants in addition to the story of Henry Shaw.
Today was the opening day of Garden of Glass with art by Craig Mitchell Smith. We saw a few of his pieces around the garden but the bulk of the art were part of a special exhibit that cost extra. Since we were short on time, we skipped it. It was clearly a big draw though and the sculptures we saw were pretty impressive.
Next up was an adventure at the
City Museum. Museum is a bit misleading. It is really a huge indoor and outdoor playground for adults and kids alike. There is an outdoor area with several stories of slides, cages, bridges, etc. that will challenge those with a fear or heights.
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| This photo shows how far the tube slide goes - see previous photo for entrance to slide. |
After exploring the outdoor portion, we found ourselves inside where there are a bunch of giant toy tops that you can sit on and spin around. We also found a human sized hamster wheel and warped wall. Tunnels and spiral staircases are common throughout. There are several levels of caves where you could spend days exploring where each turn leads. In the caves is where you find the stairs that lead up to the ten story twisting slide.
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| Entrance to City Museum |
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| Giant tops - so much fun! |
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| This whole area reminded me of a skateboard park - minus the skateboards. |
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| We were scared we would get stuck so never did go down this slide or figure out where it went. |
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| Looking up a tube we climbed down. |
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| Looking up the ten stories to the start of the largest slide |
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| Looking up to the start of the ten story slide |
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| This is the ten story slide (actually there are two identical ones side by side). |
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| The end of the ten story slide. |
Then for an extra fee when the weather is nice, there is a rooftop playground with more slides, bridges, a ferris wheel, and a school bus that is hanging off the edge of the building.
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| The left side is for sliding down, the right side is for climbing up (with the help of a rope). |
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| Look closely and you can see someone sliding down this huge slide while someone climbs up above them. |
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| The views are incredible from a ferris wheel that is on the 11th level floor of the building. |
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| This bus is actually hanging off the side of the building, 11 stories up. |
We spent about 2 hours at the City Museum but, if it hadn’t been such a long day, I think we could have spent quite a bit more time. Next time I am in St. Louis, I hope to have time to explore the City Museum some more.
