A recent grueling cross-country drive brought us right to the base of the Arch in the 90-degree, impossibly humid air of St. Louis. Christie always thought it was red. She's not sure why. But there it shone, silvery. We decided not to take the unique tram to the top, citing the $14 adult ticket and length of the roundtrip, but piled back into our prairie schooner and commenced slogging westward ho toward Fort Laramie and St. Charles Town. Should the good Lord be merciful we will make it to the base of the mountains before the first snowfall (we are driving a Volvo). A few weeks after we left, one of the tram's (many) cables broke and slapped against an electrical line, and the whole monument went pfffffttt. Hundreds of tourists were stranded for several hours and a few of them began to freak out, naturally.

More Arch pictures: [1][2][3][4]

Robert