Day 60

Day 60: 7/16/15 (St. Louis)

28 miles

We didn’t sleep in this morning because the girls were up early to go to a nail appointment.  We ended up packing up our things and leaving as well.  We had rented a house of our own with Rico’s brother and his family from Montana about 2 miles away.  When we arrived, we were happy to unpack the car and figure out what we could send home with Rico’s parents.  Sandie was already gone with the girls, but we got to see Rico’s dad for the first time in 9 weeks!  We enjoyed some breakfast and hung out on the patio for a while.  In the afternoon we walked over to the Soulard Market, but not a lot of vendor stalls were open.  After doing some more apartment hunting, we worked up a serious appetite.  Fortunately, our house was just a short walk away from one of the best BBQ joints, Bogarts.  We ordered some ribs and tri tips with coleslaw and pickles on the side.  We just ordered it to-go and only had to wait about 5 minutes – thank god because we were starving.  Once we got back we inhaled everything, and we have to say that these ribs were better than the ones we got in Memphis.

Shortly after finishing our lunch, Rico’s mom had finally come back from her morning with the girls.  She seemed like she was pretty busy so we just got a quick hello and goodbye.  Finally it was time for the rehearsal.  We showered and got dressed, and the whole lot of us piled into Jillian’s car (Isaac on Rico’s lap) and we headed to the church.  All the church doors were locked and there was no sign of the bride or groom so we were getting a little bit nervous.  Alas, Kevin (the groom) arrived and we all were let inside.  The rehearsal was a bit long to sit through, mainly because we weren’t really a part of the wedding.  Rico had to practice walking his mom down the aisle though.  After the rehearsal, we all headed over to Favazza's, an Italian restaurant on the hill (the Italian neighborhood in St Louis).  We were treated to toasted raviolis, Sicilian chicken, meatballs, and a sort of Alfredo dish.  Jillian and the kids skipped the Spumoni (weird Italian ice cream) because they were holding out for the good stuff.  We hung out a little longer after dinner and enjoyed the open bar before taking off to get some ice cream.  Ted Drewes is a little shop known for their frozen custard and concrete desserts (kind of like DQ Blizzards).  Hannah got a s’mores concrete, Rico a brownie sundae one, and Jillian got a turtle flavored one.  Isaac went with a classic oreo shake instead.  We piled back into the car and made our way home.

Once we were back, Rico got a call that he had forgotten his tux at the restaurant.  We jumped back in the car and went to Shannon’s to pick it up.  Johnny, Rico’s cousin, also invited us out on the town so we spent the next 30 minutes trying to find him.  He was staying at the hotel down by the Arch so we drove that way thinking he’d be down there.  We received a text saying he was at Lucas Park – without smart phones we had to rely on our GPS to get us places.  We found an address for the park and got out and walked around.  It was mostly filled with homeless people so we were kind of sketched out as to why Johnny would be there.  Finally, we got clued in that it was a bar on Washington so we turned around and got going in the right direction.  When we found it, we noticed that it was about a block away from Shannon’s place and we could have just walked from where we originally parked.  He had actually stumbled into one of Caitlin’s (Johnny’s sister) friends on the street and they were at the bar together.  We hung around for a few hours but at 1:30am we had to call it quits.  We’re used to New Hampshire bars which close at 1am, not 2:30am like in St Louis.  Johnny didn’t take us up on the ride home so we wished him luck and drove back to the house.  After getting home we went straight to bed.

Fact:

Italians should just stick to gelato

Lesson:

If you’re trying to find an inebriated person, it’s much easier if you have a smart phone 


Eat Well; Travel Often
Rico & Jillian