Bill and I both took a vacation day last Friday and we pretended to be tourists...hee hee hee. This is how the day evolved. When we decided arlier in the week that we were going to take Friday off, we started planning our day. At first it was just going to be the History Museum and dinner but it evolved from there. Bill had been wanting to see the Civil War exhibit at the Missouri History Museum so that was a definite on our list. We also had been wanting to eat breakfast at a pancake place in the Chesterfield Valley so I suggested we start there. Bill was then checking the hours at the History Museum and they don't open until 10:00 so Bill suggested that we go to the Botanical Garden first because they open at 9:00. For dinner, we wanted to eat at a restaurant that we had been wanting to try for some time and it's close to the Anheuser Busch Brewery so I suggested that we try to squeeze in a tour there too.Whew. OK, so here's how the day went...
We left the house around 7:45 and headed to The Original Pancake House in the valley. They have all sorts of yummy pancakes and it was really hard to choose just one. Bill had the Georgia pecan pancakes and I had the bacon pancakes! Oh yum, there was bacon in the pancakes. Oh yeah, and we split a side of bacon because you can never have too much bacon. :)
After breakfast, we headed down to the Missouri Botanical Garden.
We haven't been to the Botanical Garden since we were in grade school. I know, shame on us. Sometimes when you live in an area all your life, you take the attractions for granted. I will say that after our visit last Friday, we will definitely be visiting again, in fact, I'd like to visit at least once every season. I was amazed at how many flowers were still in bloom. I figured that most of the flowers would be done for the year which was still ok because we knew that there would be plants and flowers in the climatron.
Anyway, we walked around the grounds outside first and then headed into the Climatron. It was about 48 degrees outside and 80 degrees inside with 85% humidity.
Yes, it felt quite tropical and felt quite good actually. We walked around outside a little more and I noticed this chair that was just calling my name, wink!
Our next stop was the Missouri History Museum, another place that we haven't visited since grade school. We spent more than an hour in the Civil War exhibit and then ate lunch at Bixby's, the restaurant in the museum. It is only open for lunch Monday through Saturday and brunch on Sunday. The food was delicious. We chose three "small plates"; pumpkin and rosemary hummus, mini crab cakes and the steak and blue cheese flatbread...
We ate every bite and will definitely be visiting again! After lunch, we walked through the museum and saw 1904 World's Fair and baseball exhibits. We stayed until about 2:30 and then headed to our next stop.
We have lived in St. Louis all of our lives and have NEVER taken a tour at the Anheuser Busch Brewery, ever! That is until last Friday. The tour started at 3:00 and lasted until about 4:45 included 2 beers at the end.
The size of the brewing tanks was amazing and it would take 1 person over 130 years to drink just one tank at the rate of 1 beer per hour. Whew! We're planning on going back to take the Beer School Tour or the Brewmaster Tour. Anyway, after the tour, we walked through the AB shop and I bought a little wooden box that will live in our TV room. It's so cute and you know how much I love boxes...hee hee hee. By this time it was a little after 5:00 so we walked to our car, programmed the GPS and headed to our next stop.
Iron Barley had been on our list of restaurants to try for quite some time. I would look at the menu online and it looked good but not fantastic. Well, I started reading the reviews and everyone said that they are known for their specials and that they don't just have one or two each day but more like 8 or 10. Well, they were right. We started with one of the appetizer specials which was potato pancakes with apples and slaw. Oh my goodness, I could have made a meal of just the appetizer. For our main course, we each choose one of the specials. Bill chose the shrimp and "grits" which was roasted red pepper polenta and it was really good. I chose the chicken paprika with spaetzle. Yum!
After dinner, we stopped by Six Row for a brew; their chocolate vanilla porter. It was a small batch but I'm sure hoping that they brew it again. Anyway, it was a great ending to a fantastic day! We need to be St. Louis tourists more often...hee hee hee!
Comments