Tuesday, 24 May
Trip to Hannibal
We decided to hook the trailer to the truck before eating breakfast because the rain was forecasted to worsen during the day. We then took our showers, ate breakfast, did some last-minute cleaning, emptied the refrigerator, loaded the last-minute items into the trailer, checked the window and door locks, and shut off the water before taking off at about 9 am.
A light rain fell on us until we got north of Kansas City. It was also cold, with the temperature in the mid-50s. We had a strong headwind as we turned east toward Hannibal, which really reduced our gas mileage to about eight mpg. We stopped twice for gas. The low gas indicator was on in the truck on our last stop.
Mark Twain Cave and Campground
To get to Mark Twain Cave and Campground, we had to drive up and down some steep grades and through the city of Hannibal. The campground was at the end of a hallow (on Cave Hollow Road) at the bottom of one of those steep descents. The complex consisted of a winery, sandwich shop, handicraft shop, gift shop, and a large campground area. They offered cave tours and had a “Mark Twain Live” show every afternoon. Since it was the week before Memorial Day, much of it was closed though. The cave tours were open, and we were quite busy with school groups when we arrived.
We checked into the gift shop when we arrived, and unlike most campgrounds that load you up with paperwork, we only received a car pass during check-in and directions to our site. The internal roads were gravel and in pretty good shape. The campground was mostly wooded. All the sites were close together, of various sizes, and gravel, and most were uneven and had no grassy area between them. The front area of the campground was mostly a big gravel parking lot but had a lot of trees. The back area was mostly open with few shade trees, but they had grass between the sites, and they were still close together. They were doing a lot of construction on the sites near the front of the campground, but it did not look like they were worried about making them very level. Each site had giant fire bowls and weather-worn picnic tables. We passed a bathhouse, but it had a closed sign on it.
We had site F-17, which was at the back of the campground. It was a back-in site with a grassy field behind it. It was long, and the power and water hookups were about 10 feet from the rear of the site. I had to center the trailer on the sewer in the middle of the site, so it took my entire 50-foot water hose and the power cord to reach the utilities. I also had to park at a slight angle on the site, which helped level the trailer, but I still had to use leveling blocks.
The weather in Hannibal was partly cloudy, and in the mid-70s, it was very nice. We decided to walk up to the winery, which we found was closed, and visit the gift shop outside the cave entrance. The gift shop was fairly large and sold gemstones, jewelry, and various toys and snacks for the little ones.
We had been to Hannibal before, so we decided to just chill out at the trailer for the evening. Lisa cooked dinner on our stove. There was no Verizon cell coverage, and the camp wifi was very weak, so we just watched some Netflix and Amazon Prime movies that I downloaded to my cell phone. The rain caught up with us before bedtime, and the forecast showed rain throughout the following day.
We both feel good that we are on the road again, ready to explore.
Wednesday, 25 May
Hannibal, MO
It rained all night, but it had stopped briefly in the morning. After a leisurely breakfast and showers, we headed into town to see the Molly Brown Birthplace Museum but found it closed until Memorial Day. We then headed down to the marina to see the Mississippi River. We hung out, parked beside the river, and briefly walked around during a rain break.
Becky Thatcher’s Diner
We then decided to have lunch at Mark Twain Diner but found it closed, so we drove a short way down to the Becky Thatcher Diner. We arrived just before the lunch rush, but they only had one waitress, so the service was friendly but very slow. Lisa ordered the chicken fingers plate with fries, and I ordered the Chicken Fried Chicken with mashed potatoes and green beans. The food was excellent. We also had ordered a Root Beer float for me and a Diet Pepsi for Lisa, but the waitress never delivered them.
Lover’s Leap Overlook
After lunch, we drove up to Lover’s Leap, a beautiful, high overlook from which you could see the river and the town. It seems every town that has a high cliff overlook has a “Lover’s Leap” with a similar legend of two love-struck Indians who were unable to be together.
Mark Twain Live
We then went back to the campground to watch “Mark Twain Live”, a one-man show about the life of Samuel Clemons. The show was 45 minutes long, during which a person dressed as Samuel Clemons told us stories of his life as Samuel Clemons might have done. There was no mention of Mark Twain during his dialogue. Though the acting was pretty good, we both found it boring. There was zero audience interaction, and the stories only received a few chuckles. For $25/ea, I was hoping for a little more.
Afterward, we walked back to the camper, where we discussed our upcoming itinerary and read our email/social media before having dinner. We ended the evening by watching some more movies that I had downloaded.
Thursday, 26 June
We spent the morning at the campground casually eating breakfast and putting away everything for the move to our next destination. I went into town briefly to mail some anniversary cards and fill the tank.
The campground was located down Cave Hollow, and there was a large power station at the beginning of the road where a lot of work activity was happening. I could hear a helicopter overhead, and some workers appeared prepared to control traffic. When I got back to the trailer, we saw the helicopter fly over us several times, delivering large parts to the power station, which was interesting to see.
We left around 0900 hrs, and the weather was overcast but dry. Before we left the campground, though, we had to dump the freshwater tanks I had filled back in Olathe while de-winterizing the trailer. Unfortunately, we had hauled the weight to Hannibal, which we had calculated to be over 300 pounds. We hoped that dumping this water would give us some better gas mileage.
We had another 4-hour travel day ahead of us. Most of the time, we had good weather, but for two-thirds of the trip, we encountered a big storm with heavy rainfall and 40 mph wind gusts. The storm was in a line moving north, so the weather map showed that we would be able to get out of the storm daily quickly if Lisa could drive through it safely. She skillfully drove us through the storm, but moments like these made us thankful for our Hensley Hitch, who kept our trailer from swaying.