We broke our team caking record today! We (all four of us) found 15 cakes today. Holly and I ventured out for one last cake after dropping Tom and Chloe off at home for a well-deserved break, and we found one more...for a grand total of 16 cakes in one day! Our previous record (set on the day when we did the Fabulous Fox group) was 13.
And can I just say that I love that picture of the girls with the fork? Holly picked up the fork when we sat down to eat at Pi in the Central West End. (I can't find the pi symbol on my keyboard...have no clue how to type that.) We were all very hot and sweaty, having just come from the Bellefontaine Cemetery and Fountain Park cakes. We all needed a break before finding the last two cakes and heading home.
Anyway, there's no way to post about that many cakes at once, so I broke it up into multiple postings. If you want to read about the day in order, click here first. Then here. Then here. And finally read this post.
...so to pick up on the last set of cakes:
We went to Matthews-Dickey Boys and Girls Club after finding the two trickiest cakes on the list. This is an interesting spot for me, because I had to come here when I taught 5th grade to conference with the parents of the inner-city kids. That was back in Lindbergh's desegregation days. It's been a long time since then...we met the parents at Matthews-Dickey, so that they wouldn't have to drive all the way into the county for conferences.
The girls started to walk towards the cake, and then noticed the Jack Buck walk of fame. It was more fun to walk on the blocks than to stand by the cake, so they enjoyed that for awhile!
Then we visited the Bellefontaine Cemetery. This is a place to definitely come back and visit on a cooler day, when you have lots of time to walk around and absorb the history of the place. There are so many famous St. Louisans buried there! We did visit the spot where William Clark is buried...William Clark of "Lewis and Clark" fame. We saw Thomas Benton's spot, too. (First Missouri Senator; Benton Park is named for him.) Aldolphus Busch is there, the Lemp family, and I could go on and on. (I bought the book for $5 at the Visitor's Center. You can get a brochure that has a tour on it for free.)
Holly's faces keep us smiling, and that's for sure!
It was hot on the way to see William Clark's spot, but a really beautiful walk nonetheless.
The most visited spot in Bellefontaine Cemetery:
In Fountain Park, closer to the Central West End, there's a statue of Martin Luther King, Jr. This is still North City, but getting closer to a good spot for lunch!
Yeah, I don't know about you, but the Christmas wreath really wrecks this spot for me. This could be such a pretty little park if people would just take better care of it. Like Fairground Park, there's a lot of trash around.
We saw the cake at Left Bank Books and grabbed a picture before heading across the street to eat. We went back to the bookstore to look around afterwards.
The last cake for Chloe and Tom was at Chase Park Plaza.
Holly said she wanted to go with me to find the Noah's Ark cake at the Ameristar Casino in St. Charles. I wasn't sure exactly where it was, but we found it in the main lobby where I thought it might be. Minors aren't allowed inside, according to the signs in the parking garage at the elevators, but there were other children in the lobby looking at the fountain, playing in the arcade, and eating, so I figured it was OK to have Holly there. No one said anything to me.
Noah's Ark restaurant and hotel has been torn down for a long time now (closed in 2000 and razed in 2007). It was on the other side of the highway from where the Ameristar is, if memory serves. I can remember getting to eat there once. The outside looked so cool, a kid couldn't help but want to go inside. We used to pass by it a lot, and I can remember it well. (This picture was taken in August of 1980, by a couple who was staying there on their honeymoon.) It's a darn shame someone didn't fix this up and save it.
Cake hunting sorta celebrates all that is, and all that was in the area. There are several "remember when this used to be here" spots that have cakes. Makes me sad, a little. Oh well. Holly had fun pretending to play the games in the arcade before we left.
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