Route 66 Day 6 O'Fallon to the Arch to Chicago the end of the 66

 

I got up at 5 and took a shower then texted him to see if he wanted to get some coffee. He said yea sure give me a few. I didn’t realize that the baby was up til 3. But luckily Jess was up with her. 5 hours that’s all you need for sleep? I told him on this trip sleep is a luxury, but I wasn’t even tired. I walked outside to find the truck with rain drops on it. First time this trip that I had rain. There was some over night mist a few times but not big drops. First we tried Dunkin Donuts but that line was longer than a Starbucks here in Ca during rush hour. So off to Starbucks we went and said nope to that as well, so we went where we should have gone in the first place a Mom and Pop donut shop. As we were turning in Kyle’s door popped open right after he was making fun of the truck and how it turns. I looked at him and said you don’t have to over exaggerate my turning ya ass. The face he made told me he didn’t do it on purpose or that he even did it at all. I asked did you shut it all the way? He said uhhh yea I think, did you lock it? No how do I do that? I told him to flip the handle forward, but it still shouldn’t have popped open I said.

The donut shop had awesome apple fritters, but believe you me their coffee was on point. I had their blueberry carmel and wouldn’t you know the cup tasted like blueberry jam it was amazing. The people there were awesome. I like how they were reasonable with their masks. If you want to wear your mask cool if you don’t that’s fine too, just as long as you cover your face when you come up to order or get coffee. The trip back to his house was thankfully unimpressive. We got back and Abigail Kyle’s daughter was just getting up. Jess was feeding her with a bottle so I got to say hi to both of them. I finished my coffee and donut and he showed me the backyard which is pretty big and well situated. Then it was time for me to go and I said bye to Jess and Abigail who I cant believe is so big already. Kyle walked me out and said don’t break down between here and middle of Illinois so I don’t have to pick you up lol, and don’t get car jacked in St. Louis the arch isn’t in the safest neighborhood.

Got to St. Louis in about 30 min and the rain had stopped right after Kyle’s house the rain-x worked great. Kyle was right about it not being in the safest part of St. Louis but to be honest it wasn’t too bad. From the over night rain and early am the only people there were joggers and there wasn’t very many of them. I got some great photos of the Arch, I went up the stairs to see the arch up close, and I couldn’t get a picture of the whole thing in one shot. Unfortunately the visitor center was closed and so I couldn’t go in. But to be just looking up at at it was a cool thing to see and do. I got some gas once I crossed the bridge right before Illinos. And got some more pictures. Doesn’t look so big from far away. But nonetheless cool thing to see. From here it’s a straight shot to Chicago with only a few stops along the way.

First stop was suppose to be Weezys Bar and Grill, but they were still closed so I then stopped by Soulsby service station which is a shell station that was owned by a guy for more than 70 years. It has been restored to look like how it did originally. While I was taking pictures a professional photographer stopped by and asked how long I was going to be here. I said just a few mins. He said darn I have a bunch of equipment and would love to take pictures of your truck but it would be a few hours. I told him that would be awesome but unfortunately I have to meet my dad at 1 in Chicago. He said well you better be on your way as there will be traffic as its Friday today. I asked him how long it would take, he said with the construction I could leave now and still be probably 15 min late. He told me of a short cut to bypass some of the construction. I said thank you and left. He was right about the construction it is almost as bad as Ca.

I stopped at Cozy Dog Drive in, they invented corn dogs so I had to try them, they were pretty good I must say. Not the biggest ones, nothing near the size of the fair ones but they were tasty. I got some stickers and off I went. I wanted to stop by Funks Grove for their maple syrup and Pontiac to see all the Pontiac stuff but I didn’t have time. I got into Chicago at 230, as there was traffic in Chicago that reminded me of San Francisco. Dad was busy doing work so it didn’t matter too much. I picked him up and then we started for downtown. He wanted to get gas at Costco and I told him why I have plenty of gas im not going to go South East when we need to go West to Downtown.

We headed downtown and we took a bunch of pictures. We hit the beginning of Route 66 sign and of the Sears Tower. I wanted to go to Wrigley again so we headed that way. I didn’t realize that they had just finished a game so there was a decent amount of traffic. I got a lot of thumbs up from the fans though for the truck. It was pretty cool. From there we went to Costco so I could fill up on gas and dad could find a yellow and black bin for his luggage. While he was getting luggage and after I got gas the truck wouldn’t start again. I was not too pleased about this. But I figured it must have been all the idling and city driving in downtown. I cant believe the starter got heat soaked again!!!!!! This meant nothing to my dad cause he would still take his time to do stuff instead of having a sense of urgency. Yelling would be coming I could already feel it.  But before we could yell at each other we had to find out how we were going to go home. I told him we could do Route 66 again since he had never done it. On the other hand I have never seen Mt Rushmore, Yellowstone and neither one of us has seen Deadwood. I said if we take 80 I really want to go see Field of Dreams as well.

We decided on doing 80 as it would be faster…little did we know lol. Dinner was White Castle. I haven’t had it since I went to Chicago last time a few years ago and I really wanted it again. So we got 20 sliders chicken rings and fries. Since Iowa is close and I wanted to do Field of Dreams we decided to stop at Cedar Rapids. Along the way we passed the worlds biggest truck stop Iowa 80. Dad said he wanted to stop by but he didn’t tell me to get off until it was too late and the turn around was 3 miles past or so. I said lets just go tomorrow, I didn’t realize that it would be 50 miles out of the way but that’s for tomorrows story. We made it into the Mariott around 11 and we were both tired. I had done all the driving since dad didn’t want to drive at night and there was traffic so I don’t blame him.