We catch a whopper and learn to shoot.

Well, we have just had the best day yet. I was looking forward to learning to shoot. A friend in college said she could arrange for us to go to friends of hers, who could show us the basics of shooting if I was interested. I was very interested. Everyone seems to shoot here, most people have guns and there are a lot of places to shoot. This is probably my only chance to get my hands on a gun and have a go.
The weather continues to be ridiculously warm for the time of year and we set out with another friend to drive to a 'hobby farm', so called, just west of Jefferson City. A Hobby farm means there are no crops, no animals, except wild ones and it is kept purely for shooting and hunting and riding. What they shoot are rabbits, quail, turkeys, pigeons and deer.
Our hosts are David and Jennifer, who are charming. They live in a beautiful stone late 19th century house, stuffed full of early american furniture and antiques of all sorts. She is a collector and it's great because they use it all everyday. We sit on early 19th century hand painted chairs and eat off old china. They also have three very beautiful horses and hunting dogs. I get the impression they are not hard up!

The morning is set aside for us to have a go at shooting targets with a 22 rifle. There is one with a scope and one without and we try both. He has rigged up a bench so we can rest the gun on something and have a better chance at aiming.

We have to learn to load, prime and always put the safety catch on!

There are four of us shooting and we get quite competetive. I can see how this could be quite addictive.
We are not as silly as we look and hit consistently and near the centre of the target. We also have clay discs to hit and we do that too at 50 yards, then 100 yards. David is extremely patient, which helps.

We then try shooting standing up. I find with one hand, I can't keep the barrel steady enough, but have a go anyway.
 It was such fun and you got such a sense of achievement when you hit the target. Roland preferred the gun with the scope, but the more old fashioned wooden one, looked nicer and had a less sharp sound.
We never got round to the shotguns- maybe next time.
Feeling as if we had done rather well, or perhaps relieved that we hadn't been completely useless, we had lunch. Lunch turns out to be rather good. Jennifer bakes her own bread and it is delicious and David makes pies! Will it get any better! It turns out that when their four sons were younger, David was told if he wanted the marriage to last, he would have to take over the shopping and cooking. He did, and has been doing it ever since. Jennifer is obviously a good picker!

 It is then proposed that we might like to go out on the river with David to check his catfish lines which he put down yesterday. You are only allowed to leave them for a day and have to label your line.
The Missouri looks beautiful.

We drive the boat into the water and away we go.

David used to work for the Missouri Conservation and Development agency and knows the river pretty well. Looking at the way the water is racing past, this is not a river you would venture into without knowing what you're doing.
We all get a turn at driving the boat, even me with one hand. As you can see the watchful eye is on me!

It's great fun belting down the middle of the Missouri, going at full throttle.

You have to watch the depth monitor all the time, because it's very uneven. A lot of work has been done, building banks and underwater shelves to keep the current in the middle and to stop it ripping away at the banks. The banks are muddy clay and there are a lot of floating logs and wooden debris.

The first line is empty and we are told it is late in the year to be catching anything of any size. Then on the second line... look what we found. An absolute whopper! 39lbs to be precise, and he didn't like being caught.

Some of us got quite wet from the thrashing about.

This is David holding the fish.

Those with two hands also got their pictures with him, before he was weighed and put back.

Quite heavy I gather!! It was exciting being so near to such a big fish. Apparently one this big would be 25 years old. Catfish are very successful in the Missouri because they don't mind the muddiness. They are predatory and will eat other fish, including other catfish. Unfortunately some asian carp have found there way into the Missouri, and are doing well, although I can't see them outdoing these monsters.

The last line has a couple of what normally I would consider quite large fish on it, but they now looked so small. I could hold these, then they were put back to get bigger.

It has been a wonderful day, with lots of new experiences. The weather was perfect, our hosts couldn't have been nicer and we all left with silly grins on our faces because we'd had such a good time.

I'm not sure with one hand whether I'd ever be able to shoot a bird or a rabbit, but I think target shooting could be fun as a sport. It was nice to be with people who don't like hand guns but like rifles and hunting. A sensible distinction I feel. I think if you eat meat, you should be prepared to kill it. There is so much uncultivated land here, it makes sense to use land for hunting. I feel we have had a real taste of America and Missouri in particular. We were asked if we missed the UK and we had to say no, not so far!

Almost to Arkansas.

The weather forecast for the weekend is brilliant- literally. A huge swathe of the middle of America is experiencing temperatures 15-25 degrees above the norm for this time of year. Fahrenheit, I hasten to add. This bodes well for our three day trip into the Ozarks to the south.
We drive via Lake of the Ozarks, which sounds so romantic, but is not. It is another dammed river, this time the Osage River. It is a big holiday resort. Lots of people, huge strip development, lots of boats and generally commercialized- yuk. Our immediate reaction is to drive through it as quickly as possible, only stopping briefly at a Walmart, which we always use for loo stops. It's good to know they have a use.
We get further south, to a much quieter part of this huge lake, which goes on for miles, and find a picnic spot. Artificial lakes are a bit dull. The edges don't look right!

We disturb two buzzards and a flock of geese, who don't like our company. I'm not fast enough to get a picture of the buzzards.
We then go to one of the hundreds of National Parks, which are everywhere. Most are named after Mark Twain, but this one has the wonderful name- Ha Ha Tonka, which apparently means laughing water.
This whole area is full of caves, sinkholes, underground streams and caverns.  This is a 'Karst' landscape and apparently a very important geological site.
 The first thing we see is this natural stone bridge.

We go through the arch and walk to the edge of the next gorge. There are hundreds of steps down to the river at the bottom and a view across to a ruined large house.

We walk down and over and up the other side on wooden stairs. It must have taken a long time to build them all. We go past sunken caves, which seem to go down forever. They have their own micro climates- pretty cold, with plants dating back to the ice age.
The ruin is of a large house, built by a wealthy industrialist, which burnt down. It's rather beautiful, but you can't see it very well in my not very good photo! Again, the landscape reminds us of the Lot in France.

We are feeling extremely virtuous because we've had lots of exercise. It is quite hot,  86 degrees F.
We then head off to Mansfield for the night.
 We go via one of the more reclusive Amish communities near Seymour. I didn't know there were any Amish in Missouri. We pass several black buggies and drivers with their long beards and bright blue shirts. They seem to be living in a large commune. There is a huge vegetable garden and children in long dresses playing and it looks like a film set. We get a very cheery wave from an old Amish man. I don't take photos.
Mansfield is my choice. It has the Laura Ingalls Wilder museum, which I am keen to see. I love her books about her childhood in pioneering days. If you haven't read them, try them.
 Our B and B is in the centre of town and much to Roland's delight almost on top of the railway line!!! Luckily, not too many trains are going through, just enough to keep him happy.

Our room is very comfortable, but we have to rush next door to a rather sad mexican restaurant before it closes at 7. No glass of wine to help it down, just iced water.
Next morning, breakfast is grim. Served on polystyrene plates with plastic cups, knives and spoons, the food matches! Watery coffee to wash it down.
The food was horrible, but the museum is excellent and we get there before anybody else.

We get a guided tour of the house she lived in and even Roland enjoys it all. He has never read the books and probably never will.
We then set off south on highway 63, to Grand Gulf National Park on the Arkansas border.  We get into the mood by listening to 'Big Country 99" with 'The Rooster'. Brilliant! The radio stations down here are either country or religious, an easy choice!
  This is another park of chasms, natural bridges and the like. It also has a very volatile river system. Unluckily for us, the river is non existent at the moment. It can be a raging torrent and it fills the valleys instantly.

We can see that it could be spectacular!!! Never mind. The walk through the trees is lovely.

We then try to find the wonderful, out of the way B and B that I've booked for the night, with hostess Sherry, who has a 'herb shack'. We drive through some beautiful back roads. The autumn colours are lovely and it is still hot, but we cannot for the life of us find the place. We have been driving for quite a while now and it's getting late, so we give up and head for the nearest town. There is no phone reception, so I can't ring for directions.
We end up in a Holiday Inn, which we are very pleased to see, but it wasn't quite what I was looking forward to. Dinner is a take away pizza in our room, but at least it means we can drink beer with it, and jolly good it tastes too- the beer!
Breakfast is another dismal, polystyrene affair. It's not a good way to start the day.

Our trip today is to the Onondaga cave in the Onondaga State Park. Missouri has nearly 6,000 discovered caves, presumably there are a lot more.
This one is spectacular.

It has everything- stalactites, stalagmites. Some look quite rude!

 Flowstones, draperies, cave coral etc. and the cavern is huge. It's wider than a football pitch and as tall and it seems to on for ever. A river flows along the bottom.

The colours are vivid.

It is good the whole way through, and it has bats.

Certainly worth a visit. There were plans to dam yet another river here, which would have flooded the cave, but it was voted out.

We came back via Herman, which is in the middle of Octoberfest, which seems to have livened the place up no end. There are wine tastings, beer gardens and lots of people. It's nice to see so many people in the streets. There is a real atmosphere to the place. We walk down to the muddy Missouri, which is flowing at a fair old pace.

The water in the Mississippi is flowing at three times it's normal rate for this time of year and it looks as though the Missouri is not far behind. I hadn't quite appreciated just how important these two rivers are to the geography of the area.
We get home safe and sound. It's still 80 degrees. It was a lot of driving for Roland, which he is not that keen on. It's easy to underestimate the distances. This is a very big country. We feel we have seen a good bit of Missouri, but there is a lot more......

Roland's night and an enormous stick insect!

The build up was so great,  I forgot to report how it went! Well the lecture was a great success. The great and the good of Fulton turned up- predominantly old men- heads of banks and the like, the President and his wife, lots of Roland's colleagues, not just historians. A very supportive lot. They seemed to like what they heard. Apparently a previous professor had made the mistake of being highly critical of Churchill. The audience politely clapped, but it did not go down well. This was about Churchill and his friendships with Americans, forged at times of war, you couldn't really go wrong. Lots of photos were taken, but they don't seem to have appeared anywhere yet. So no photos of the big occasion. There was a wine and cheese buffet afterwards and Roland was pleased with it all. Fame for a day, now it's back to the routine. Roland claimed he didn't like all the attention, but I think he rather enjoyed it.
The next thing is our little trips to the Ozarks. Since I have no photos of the lecture I thought I would leave you with this enormous stick insect, found in the road outside the library.

It's the biggest one I've ever seen.

And I might as well throw in a few more Halloween pictures. They're getting sillier!

The last two were in a supermarket in Columbia.

This is an insurance office in town

North to Mexico! and a covered bridge.

The place names round here continue to amuse me. On the local radio they keep referring to Mexico, to the north, which is slightly disconcerting.
On sunday, a beautiful, very cold, sunny day we set off to see Mark Twain's birthplace and the countryside around. They are very proud of Mark Twain here and he certainly was an interesting and witty man. I read Tom Sawyer for the first time I enjoyed it but thought it rather dated and spread a bit thin. Roland read Huckleberry Finn and thought it had good bits. We have started on some short stories.

Sunday morning is a very good time to go driving. Most people are in church and the roads are empty. We go through Mexico, Santa Fe and stop just before Florida- it gets very confusing. The birthplace is a small, two roomed wooden cottage, removed from it's original position in the nearby village and placed inside a purpose built Mark Twain museum. The museum is large and interesting and we are the only visitors. It is set in the Mark Twain national park, of which there is rather a lot.
Here is the huge lake made from damming the Salt river. It is surrounded by trees. The setting is lovely and empty. We wish we had brought a picnic as it is warm if you stay in the sun.

We managed to find a sandwich place open for lunch in the thriving metropolis of Florida!
We then head west via Paris to look at a covered bridge.















There used to be thirty covered bridges in Missouri. By 1958 there were only eight left. Now, there are just four!

This one is the Union covered bridge and is the only double Burr-arch one. You can see what that means from a photo of the interior.

The interior is very impressive despite the fact it is covered in graffiti. Apparently Burr designed this type of arch, which enabled bridges to be much longer, without losing strength. This has two, just to make sure!

As you can see, the bridge is in need of a bit of love and attention. The timber here was removed by park rangers, to allow the water to go through more easily in a recent flood and stop the whole thing being swept away. Considering how high up this bridge is, the water must have risen dramatically.

Even though it is need of repair, it looked very solid and beautifully made. I've always wanted to see a covered bridge like this and it didn't disappoint. I got a bit carried away taking photos, but the construction was fascinating.

That was a real treat.

We saw this barn on the way home. There are a lot of very beautiful barns. Wooden, often with tin roofs looking very northern european in style. Haven't been able to photo many as there is nowhere to stop.
This was on a very quiet back road and that is a turkey vulture or buzzard as they are called here, sitting on the top.

I tried to get closer, but he flew away. They are everywhere and are massive birds, with a wingspan of up to 109 inches!
Getting back to barns, they are usually this colour or white and there are some very interesting ones. More later, if I can get Roland to stop the car in time!

We had dinner out on saturday at a colleagues house. The rest of the guests were retired from the college, but were an interesting group, apart from when they started to talk about dogs.....
 Everyone has a dog here, and out here, it probably makes sense. It's still a dull thing to talk about.
The most interesting thing about the evening was the house itself. We had walked past it several times and really liked the look of it.

Dark, mysterious with a gazebo round the side. It turns out that this is the house designed and lived in by Bell himself. Fulton's famous architect. It was just as eccentric inside. He liked parrots and the parrot had an inside room, with wooden fretwork cage and the gazebo for summertime. The present owners have stuffed it full of antiques, so there is not a bit of wall or surface uncovered. Wonderful to look at, hell to keep clean. The roof is so complicated, that when it needed re-roofing they couldn't find a roofer who would touch it. They ended up doing it themselves and I gather it was not easy!
The food was good. All homemade and delicious. What a relief. Plenty of good wine too, so a very jolly evening.

Tonight's the night, so I'm off to dress for the occasion!

Pumpkins and other things.

Autumn is celebrated in a big way here, culminating in Halloween. The shops, peoples houses, businesses have all had their decorations up now for over two weeks. They don't just stick one lonely pumpkin in the window, they decorate the entire house, inside and out, with ghosts, ghouls, witches, cobwebs, spiders and pumpkins. You look in peoples windows and see tombstones and the like.

Walmart is awash with orange decorations.

 Pumpkin outside lights, decorative gourds, scarecrows, Halloween clothes and a whole mountain of trick or treat paraphernalia.

As you can see, it's cheap.

 We still have a whole month before Halloween! There is a Halloween parade in town, which we must make sure we see.
Outside of town we can go to a corn maze and pick our own pumpkin from the pumpkin patch, or just buy it cheap from Walmart.

 A pumpkin man has appeared at the farmer's market, who is not unlike the pumpkins he is selling- rotund!

I started talking to him and he was a very nice man. He is a teacher of agriculture at the local school and pumpkins are his hobby. Orange is his favourite colour!

His van was a weird and wonderful selection of pumpkins, some heritage varieties. Some were valued by the indians because they would last all winter. They are the less beautiful ones. Some of them look as if they are covered in warts! Most of them taste better than the one that is commonly used for Halloween decorations. I thought they were beautiful. He gave me one of the little ones as a present.

 Everywhere there are huge pots of chrysanthemums in autumnal shades, which people place round their front gardens. I like it! It seems to be an acknowledgement that the season is on the turn.

On a different note, a new friend was collecting a cake for her daughter's birthday. While we waited I flipped through the designs they offered and was amused to see a cake with a man with a shotgun on one side of the cake and a dead deer on the other! I didn't think that would be a big seller in Islington.

Roland has appeared in the local paper and would have been interviewed on the radio if he was prepared to be in college at 6.30am, which he wasn't. So I thought I would leave you with his cheery face..

And his photo taken specially for his interview on the college website

We have been invited to a party tonight. 6pm!!! They do start early. I will be interested to see what they eat, drink and do at parties.