We Drove Across the State of Missouri Today

The bridge across the Mississippi at St. Louis on the way west

Here's the Mississippi with the Gateway Arch and downtown St. Louis in the background

We left Casino Queen RV Park at about 9:11 a.m. under bright sunny skies I hadn't remembered Missouri as being so hilly. I was thinking all we would see today was corn fields. Boy was I wrong. We were also driving into the wind although it wasn't a very windy day so our mileage wasn't as good as it has been. We stopped near Springfield, MO for fuel. Originally we had thought we could make the whole trip on one tank however with the terrain and the wind we thought we'd better fill up.

I had called ahead to the Joplin, MO KOA and was told there were lots of sites. We got here about 2:45 p.m. and were setup by 3:50 p.m. We elected not to set up the TV as we can get all the major stations with the aerial. We'll be heading Oklahoma City way tomorrow so the less we have to do to get back on the road the better.

Here's our site at the Joplin KOA, Joplin, MO

Joplin appears to be a nice small city of about 45,000 people. The campground is a typical KOA, gravel sites but has FHU and 50 amp. It was also nice and warm when we arrived and about 70F (21C) so we had the door open for a bit. The inside temperature of the RV rose quickly without benefit of heater or furnace after we got parked from 65F (18C) to 70F (21C) in about 30 minutes.

Once we got set up although tired we headed out to get some groceries at the local SuperWalmart as there are some staples that I'm out of. We are 4 miles from the Oklahoma border at this campground and not far from the Kansas border either so we drove the 10 miles to the little town of Galena in Kansas and took some photos to say we've been there. But "we're not in Kansas any more Toto" (LOL). While we were out we had dinner at Taco Bell. Yeah! I didn't have to cook!

Here are two photos of proof that we were in Kansas