If your vacation plans include driving, you just may be …
Jim Fall
The first of June means a couple of things to me.
First, despite what we may have encountered for the past several weeks, it’s gonna get hotter than h-e-double l any day now.
And probably stay that way for quite some time.
So, what do we do?
We begin to make some plans to get away for a couple of days.
Maybe even a week or so.
But before you spend too many hours on the Internet looking for “that perfect spot,” perhaps you might to give our own home state a little more than a passing glance.
There are, actually, quite a few top-flight attractions to visit without ever leaving the friendly confines of Missouri.
Believe it or not, the most popular tourist attraction in our state is the Gateway Arch in St. Louis.
I would have bet that No. 2 Branson would have been tops, but what do I know?
Third is much closer to home — the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City.
The theme park and craft opportunities, combined with Marvel Cave, make Silver Dollar City the state’s No. 4 spot to visit.
No. 5, Forest Park in St. Louis is reasonably well known, much more so than the next most popular spot, Wilson’s Greek National Battlefield near Republic.
The next two, Nos. 7 and 8, are undoubtedly much more familiar, Mark Twain’s boyhood home in Hannibal and the Harry S Truman Library and Museum in Independence.
Surprisingly enough, No. 9 is the 31-room Vaile Mansion, ranking just a notch ahead of the Truman Home. Both are located in Independence.
The combination of the Missouri Capitol and other attractions rank Jefferson City as the state’s 11th most popular place to visit. Springfield rounds out the top 12.
To steal a line — or, actually, several lines — from comedian Jeff Foxworthy, “If ‘vacation’ means driving to Silver Dollar City, Worlds of Fun or Six Flags, you might be from Missouri.”
But Mr. Foxworthy, who is a very funny man, I think, didn’t stop there.
There are several other “if you thinks …” about our fair state:
If you failed world geography in school because you thought Cuba, Versailles, California, Nevada, Houston, Cabool, Louisiana, Springfield, and Mexico all were cities in Missouri — and they all are, mind you — you might be from Missouri.”
• If you’ve worn shorts and a jacket at the same time, you may live in Missouri.
• If you’ve had a lengthy telephone conversation with someone who dialed a wrong number, you may live in Missouri.
• If you know several people who have hit a deer more than once, you may live in Missouri.
• If someone in The Home Depot store offers you assistance and they don’t even work there, you may live in Missouri.
• If you can drive 75 mph through two feet of snow during a raging blizzard without flinching, you may live in Missouri.
• If driving is better in the winter because the potholes are filled with snow, you may live in Missouri.
• If you install security lights on your house and garage, but leave both doors unlocked, you may live in Missouri.
• If you carry jumper cables in your car and your wife knows how to use them, you may live in Missouri.
• If everyone in your family has been on a “float trip,” you may live in Missouri.
• If “Down South” means Arkansas, you might be from Missouri.
• If you ever rode a school bus for more than an hour each way, you might be from Missouri.
• If you had school classes canceled because of cold, you’re probably from Missouri.
• If you had school classes canceled because of heat, you’re probably from Missouri.
• If you can recognize whether another Missourian is from the Boot Heel, Ozarks, Eastern, Middle or Western Missouri soon as they open their mouth, you’re probably from Missouri.
• If you know that Harry S Truman, Walt Disney, George Washington Carver and Mark Twain are all from Missouri, well … you guessed it.
• If you know what “Home of the Throwed Roll” means, you’re probably from Missouri.
• If you know what’s supposed to be “knee-high by the Fourth of July,” you’re probably from Missouri.
• If you pronounce Missouri with an “ah” at the end, you’re probably from Missouri.
• If you think “deer season” is a national holiday, you’re probably from Missouri.
• If you’ve ever said (or heard) “It’s not the heat, it’s the humidity,” you’re probably from Missouri.
• If you’ve seen people wear bib overalls to funerals, you’re probably from Missouri.
• If your idea of a traffic jam is 10 cars waiting to pass a tractor, you’re probably from Missouri.
• If you’ve seen farmers stop work and remove their hat as a funeral passes by, you’re probably from Missouri.
• If you have switched from “heat” to “A/C and back again in the same day, you may live in Missouri.
The final one attributed to the Foxworthy routine really fits us here in Maryville.
• If the phrase, “I’m going to the lake this weekend” has only one meaning, and everyone knows what you’re talking about, you may live in Missouri.
In the past 20 years, our own Mozingo Lake Recreation Park has become a true destination, not only for Maryville and Nodaway County residents, but for fun-loving folks within easy driving distance from across the four-state area.
After all, the lake is rated as one of the Top 100 fishing locations in the United States, the championship golf course is challenging, to say the least, and a spectacular new junior course opens soon.
What about a lodge and conference center?
