More Missouri Trip

Before I forget - I want to tell you all a little about the rest of our trip out west to Missouri last week. It wasn't all grandbaby cuddling, even though that was the highlight of the week!
As we headed down I-64 into the sunset, we first stopped at The Log Inn in Warrenton. This is Indiana's oldest continuously operating restaurant and lays claim to the fact that Abe Lincoln stopped here back in 1844. In fact I think we ate in the same log cabin dining room as Abe! We've eaten here several times in the past when we used to shoot trap at the Evansville Gun Club. If you go, get the fried chicken !
Since D's company has an office in St. L also, he was able to work out of that office for a couple of days while I played with little J. This is the only time the little Harley booties will be worn, as his little feet aren't so little! But the Harley bunny will have to provide some Harley influence.
We left the new parents in charge for the weekend and decided to explore a little of Missouri and the northern edge of Arkansas. We didn't get far. The bike had been losing oil pressure, getting hot (or hotter than usual!) and becoming more noisy. So the first dealership we saw, we pulled in to see if they could diagnose the problem. Even though it was near their closing time, these nice guys at Bourbeuse Valley Harley Davidson began pulling parts off right and left. About 45 minutes later, we were back on the road with what we thought was a smooth running machine. For the next twenty-four hours, D bragged on the mechanic that had made our Harley run better than ever. Unfortunately, that's about how long it took before the problems returned.


The guys at the dealership did give us a good tip for our dinner that night. The Missouri Hick Barbecue restaurant in Cuba, Missouri. Decorated with old tools and playing some hillbilly music, they serve a good barbecue here. I think it is located on the old Route 66.Here's the first food photo for you all! We both had the sampler plate. Weight Watchers here I come!
Our Harley-Davidson map has featured rides outlined in each state. This one may have had nice smooth roads and the scenery had some nice highlights, but not much variety. Just a lot of curvy tree-lined roads. There were a lot of river rafting and canoeing places along the way. We talked to a group of 50-somethings at our motel in Cuba, MO that were headed to a canoe trip on one of the rivers. Sounded like fun, but also a lot of work! Next stop, Fred's Fish House in Mammoth Spring, Arkansas. We had something here that was new to us, pickled green tomatoes. If we ever go back to this part of the state, we'll have to spend some time at the state parks and maybe do some hiking or canoeing - then maybe we wouldn't need WW! We didn't make it to Eureka Springs or Branson either. Someday we'll get back there when we can spend some time doing the tourist thing. We covered several miles on this leg of the trip and even stopped at another H-D dealership, Ozark Harley-Davidson. More super nice folks there, but still couldn't fine the source of our problems. We spent the night in Osage Beach and continued our trip back to St. L on Sunday morning.
We followed the Missouri River and traveled through the Missouri Wine Country with stops in Herman and Augusta, Mo. Two different but interesting little towns. This would make a nice little day ride from St. Louis. I'm not sure how many wineries there are in this area, but I think there's quite a few. We had lunch at the Vintage Restaurant at the Stone Hill Winery in Herman.

By now, you've figured out that we only stopped for food and Harley Dealerships on this little trip. However, we did stop at a few little shops. My favorite was The Uptown Store in Augusta.

We made in back to St. L in time to give little J a few Grandpa cuddles before he headed back toward home on Monday. One last Joey photo in this epic post. Training for a road trip to come visit Grammie and Grandpa some time soon I hope! Sorry this has been kind of a long one but thanks for sticking with it if you've made it this far! After all, we truly were "on the road"!

(Harley update. We continued to have problems on the ride home even stopping at a couple more dealerships. But the guys back home at Louisville Harley-Davidson worked some magic and we're back in business. I can't explain what the problem was or what they did to it, but as of today, Sunday, D is a happy Harley guy!)