Saturday, May 17
We decided to backtrack a little this morning to some places that sounded interesting in Missouri.
First stop, the World Bird Sanctuary, was near St. Louis. Great heavily treed park that is home to over 200 birds, mostly birds of prey, most of which have been injured in some way. There is a “hospital” there also and birds are released when possible. Most of the birds are outside in spacious cages. Boy Scouts in the area have contributed a lot of Eagle Project hours in building cages, benches, fences and other things.
This Eurasian Eagle Owl was the first to catch our eye. Huge - probably 20-24" tall - and beautiful.
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| Eurasian Eagle Owl |
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| Bald Eagle |
This Bald Eagle had just finished a long bath and looked pretty pathetic. There were many types of owls, hawks, eagles, kestrels, sand cranes, some pelicans, osprey, a kookaburra, homing pidgeons, some chickens and turkeys and a huge Andean Condor (9 foot wing span, but we couldn’t get him to show off) and more.
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| Great Horned Owl |
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| Turkey Vulture |
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| Red shouldered Hawk |
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| White Hawk |
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| Long crested eagle |
This Tawny owl HAS to be the model for the Ewoks! Scientists think it has the best vision of any bird.
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| tawny owl |
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| Royal Palm Turkey |
The kookaburra actually laughed - I'm pretty sure it was in response to my singing that old kookaburra song from girl scouts!
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| Laughing Kookaburra |
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| Snowy Owl or Barn Owl, not sure... |
Next we headed to a small German town on the Missouri River named Hermann.
They were having a Maifest today, so we parked and walked around the town. They have several wineries and a brewery and were busy today!
We stopped at a deli which specialized in
worsts and had a knackworst and an asiago and pear worst. Hot German potato salad and a wonderful peach and pecan bread pudding. Yum!
There was an area with crafts, various food stalls and a huge play area for kids.
Lots of people out having a good time in THE SUN!
From Hermann we headed to Fulton, home to Westminster
College and the Winston Churchill Museum!!
Odd place for a Churchill museum, but we found that he had actually
given a speech here (the famous one where he first used the term “iron
curtain”)back in 1946 as a guest of President Truman. There was quite a bond and as a result, a
church that had been bombed out in London, was re-built here in Fulton. It was designed by Christopher Wren
originally, and actually some of the foundation dated back to the 1200’s. 7,000 stones from the church were shipped
here and there is a beautiful pulpit from 1638. They were preparing for a wedding today. The
Churchill museum is under the church.
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| Church with part of Berlin Wall to the left foreground |
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| Pulpit from 1638 |
It is quite extensive, with loads of history; Churchill’s mother was an American. He was a poor student until he found a
subject that interested him and then became quite successful in military
school. He served in the military in
India, in World War I and of course was an integral part of World War II and
served as Prime Minister twice. We ran
out of time as they turned the lights off on us at 4:30.
We drove to and camped at Mark Twain State Park which had
beautiful facilities on huge Mark Twain Lake .
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