National Parks - Missouri

Gateway National Park

7/13/1988 Walked around Jefferson National Expansion Memorial [Gateway Arch NHL], went up in arch.

A nice view from afar

The arch in the sun

A good view of St. Louis

The arch in the Mississippi

6/4/2017 We parked in a garage and walked a block to the Old Courthouse, now the visitor’s center for the Gateway Arch NHL (Jefferson National Expansion Memorial)[, on the Mississippi River Water Trail NRT]. Here we got our unigrids and just checked our tickets and got walking instructions to the Arch (construction has things a little messed up). We walked over, zipped through security and were on a short line before our 8:40 scheduled tour. We boarded one of about eight little cars, each carrying a maximum of five people. These cars translated diagonally, then more vertically, climbing the 630 feet in about four minutes. We exited at the viewing area and spent a while enjoying the views. We particularly liked the view of the Eads Bridge, and could see the endpoint area of the NR. Back down to the ground we did some souvenir shopping and took our outside photos. The photos included the Eads Bridge NHL. Opened in 1874, it was one of the earliest long bridges built across the Mississippi, the world's first all steel construction, and built high enough so steamboats could travel under.

The park sign

The view from the VC

Approaching the arch

Me up top ...

... and Ken

A great panorama west

Eads Bridge NHL

Cool view

The view from near the river