Day 13: Columbia to Paducah KY

We started out towards St. Louis today on I-70 along with a hoard of trucks. Jim thinks the car to truck ratio on this stretch is easily 1 to 6 or more. They are everywhere. It has been raining since yesterday, off and on -- sometimes heavy. But we are used to that.

Rest stops have become a real challenge with all the new automatic fixtures that you have to figure out just to get your task accomplished. It is not always obvious how to get the toilet to flush or how to get to soap, water, or how to get your hands dry. The quest for a paperless bathroom is in full swing. I'm so glad that they have not found a way to get rid of toilet paper. That is a spooky thought...

Anyway, I spend my time waving my hands in front of anything, trying to hit the motion detector. Fortunately, they have those buttons on the toilets. I refuse to wave my butt around trying to find the sensor. And each rest stop is different.

Today, I encountered the "no touch, no move hand washing experience." It is a basin, recessed into the wall with various devices located top, center. When I first encountered it, I decided it was for hand washing so I put my hands in and waved them around. I felt some soap squirt onto my hands and immediately water started coming down on my hands. Then the water abruptly stopped and I pulled my hands out as I heard the hand dryer start up. Yep, they had one of those in there too. Problem was that the rinse cycle did not remove all the soap, and try as I could waving my hands back and forth, I couldn't get the water back -- just the hot air drying the soap on my hands. Once I figured out what was going on, I put my hands into the next NTNMHE basin, quickly moving my hands aside to try and avoid the soap cycle. Something is wrong when you have to outsmart an machine just to wash your hands.

Back on the road to St. Louis which was founded by a French fur trader in 1764. The first settlers came up the river from New Orleans and early explorers including Lewis and Clark gathered here. The settlement was almost wiped out by floods, cholera, and a catastrophic fire, but rebounded to a population of 300,000 in 1870. According to my AAA tour book, the population in 1904 was 200,000 so either the first figure was a misprint or lots of folks departed for points West during that period. Today the population is 348,000.

St. Louis was the birthplace of the ice cream cone, hot dog, and ice tea ( at the Great Louisiana Purchase Exposition.)

St. Louis is located at the confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi. Both rivers were at least as wide as the Columbia at Portland. Very impressive, especially since we have been following the Missouri all the way from the Headwaters in Montana.

We also encountered a highway confluence. We went from I-70 to I-370 to I-270 to (Illinois) I-55 to I-64. It was like an Interstate traffic circle. We travelled through the tip of Illinois changing Interstates several times until we ended up on I-24 to Nashville.

As we were approaching Metropolis, Illinois the car's "Service Engine Soon" light came on. Jim stopped at a deserted exit and went out to look at the engine. Almost immediately a white pickup pulled up and a friendly voice said, "need any help." The fellow got out and helped Jim look things over. He was a truck driver and mechanic. They decided everything looked OK and it was probably nothing important. He was very helpful and friendly and had gotten off the freeway to help us. We were very impressed. We later discovered the problem was that Jim had not put the gas cap on tightly. We fixed that and the light eventually went out. Crisis averted.

I made Jim exit at Metropolis, which was officially declared the hometown of Superman by the Illinois House of Representatives in 1972. I wanted to go to the Superman Museum which has the phone booth used by Clark Kent to change into Superman and lots more. Jim said he would not go in -- He considered this in the category of the California drive-through tree -- tourist trap. I finally coaxed him to came in and we enjoyed the vast collection of memorabilia. But he wouldn't let me take a picture of him anywhere near the museum.

We decided it was time to stop, so we pulled off just across the Kentucky line at Paducah (Pa duke ka). After checking in to a motel, we headed for downtown to explore. Old Town is right on the Ohio River which is very large at this point. They have a 10 foot sea wall along the port area that has been painted with murals depicting the history of the area. The area was charming with old brick buildings housing restaurants, bakeries, a market and other businesses. In the midst of this is a huge modern theater/opera house. We really enjoyed this town.

Off to find Jim's relatives in Tennessee tomorrow.