Took a little trip to Branson Missouri for an early-autumn vacation in the Ozark Mountains.
Top of the Rock Lodge
Branson, Missouri
We finished our week in Branson with some remarkable tours and shows. Lemme tell ya – if you can dream it up, you can build it in Branson! How about a golf cart tour around the highest mountain in the area? That’s what we did at Top of the Rock.
Branson, Missouri
Okay, I’m combining a bunch of events here, but we did see a Stampede of Trained Elvis Butterflies. Just not in that order.
Amazing Branson offers entertainment choices for every age and humor. We picked a handful of shows and attractions to visit and here’s the first set of reviews.
Branson, Missouri
Ozark Mountains
View Map
Branson is one crazy tourist town. If Las Vagas married Gatlinburg and they honeymooned in Florida, that would be Branson. There’s everything here!
You take a couple hundred theaters and shows, add in some glitzy tourist attractions, sprinkle liberally with restaurants and shopping, and stuff it all in the pretty hills of the Ozarks and you’ve got Branson. Best place we’ve ever been!
Lambert’s Cafe
Sikeston, Missouri
View Map
After a long day on the road who wouldn’t want to toss back a few? We’re traveling west with our intrepid cousins and caught dinner at Lamberts Cafe. Literally caught dinner – it was tossed to us!
Hannibal, Missouri
View Map
The celebrated American author and humorist Mark Twain (born Samuel Clemens, 1835-1910) was raised in Hannibal, Missouri. A bustling riverboat port during the time of slavery, Hannibal had curiously odd residents who later became the inspiration for many of Twain’s characters: rough riverboat captains, desperate runaway slaves, riff-raff river boys, and prim townsfolk. His most famous books, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer were set in Hannibal and the characters were a composite of people Twain remembered as a boy.
Today Twain would feel right at home, as Hannibal still has a river port with a steamboat and preserved turn-of-the-century downtown buildings. What Twain wouldn’t recognize is the proliferation of his name and image on every possible marquee, and he’d be astonished at how he has become a singularity in this town. It’s Mark Twain everything here. Which is why we’ve come!
We started our tour at the Mark Twain Museum and I was overjoyed to find a dozen original Norman Rockwell paintings upstairs. Rockwell illustrated editions of Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer, and his sketches and proofs were on display, too.
The Clemens’ home is also preserved as a museum. Samuel’s father died at a young age (he rode through a storm on horseback and caught pneumonia) and his mother had to take in boarders to make the rent. In fact, young Samuel was forced to leave school at age 11 because the family couldn’t afford 25 cents per week to pay the teacher. Sam Clemens finished his education by apprenticing with a printer to set type (called a “printer’s devil”) and he credits that time spent proofreading with making him a discerning writer.
On the hills spreading from downtown are the old residential areas. Victorian homes line the streets, some rather ragged and ramshackle. Above them all, on a tall cliff, stands Rockcliffe Mansion. This 14,000 sq. ft. home was built at the turn of the century by lumber baron John J. Cruikshank. It’s filled with art nouveau furnishings, Tiffany lamps, and period antiques. When Cruikshank died, his widow took her clothes and one favorite chair, locked the door and left for good. The mansion stood abandoned for 43 years and the Hannibal city council wanted to demolish it. But local citizens banded together to save the property and now it’s open for tours and overnight stays.
About a mile out of town, high on a bluff above the Mississippi River, is Lovers Leap – a promontory where legend has that two Indian lovers from competing tribes leapt to their fate rather than be separated. This spot was featured in Twain’s novels and spurred three adventurous boys in 1967 to scale the cliff like Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer. Tragically they were never seen again, despite months of searching.
Tim Sawyer & Barky Thatcher
Our campground was also filled with attractions including the Mark Twain Cave (where Tom Sawyer and Becky Thatcher got lost) and a one-man show by a skilled impersonator that kept us giggling as he recited humorous Twain stories. The cave was an unusual honeycomb of narrow passages, about elbow wide, and was discovered in 1819 by Jack Sims who chased a panther down a hole. In Twain’s time, the cave was an exciting adventure shared by all of Hannibal’s children who would pack candles and a picnic lunch and go exploring.
We ended our tour to Hannibal with a riverboat cruise on the Mississippi. As the saying goes – It’s too thin to plow, and too thick to drink!
Arrow Rock, Missouri
View Map
Pretending to be morning people, we exited Lake Rudolf at 7am. There must have been a Hot Rod convention in Evansville, as we saw scores of fly jalopies cruising by.
Past the state line, rolling hills and deciduous trees began to give way to a flat and featureless landscape. Fields of withered soybeans and parched, stunted corn told the tale of this summer’s drought. In an odd coincidence, we spotted a roadside wildfire just past Burnt Prairie, Illinois.
.
Approaching St. Louis, a traffic jam over the bridge gave us a good long view of the Arch.
We ran through a surprise storm front with bursts of gusty crosswinds, making for some lively steering. Anxious to get off the road for lunch, Tim was pleading for the next rest area but I pointed the coach to Reifsnider State Forest instead. And it certainly was an off-road experience. We ended up on a wildly steep gravel road, with no opportunity to turn back, and were forced to cross a half- dry rocky creek. I bottomed out the coach coming and going. But we managed to have a lovely picnic once the adrenaline subsided, and I’ve made a mental note that “State Forest” means unpaved roads.
Mid-afternoon we arrived at Arrow Rock to camp for the evening. This historic town was once a bustling riverboat port. Blockades during the Civil War and the advance of western railroads put the town into serious decline. Then, in an unkind final blow, the Missouri River spitefully changed course and left the town a mile from the water and without purpose.
Nowadays Arrow Rock is a sweet little tourist stop. It’s only a couple of streets wide, lined with original stone curbs. The Lyceum auditorium was happily crowded this evening.
