The City Museum

Remember waaaaaay back to January when I made the New Year's resolution to be a more culturally diverse person? I made it a point this year to do more culturally sophisticated stuff like go to museums and attend concerts. I saw our mini vacation to St. Louis no differently and we headed to a museum.

The City Museum.

This is a museum like no other. I've been processing the whole experience for the last few days because it just blew my mind. I walked around for five hours completely overwhelmed by one man's (Bob Cassilly) vision and creativity.

An accurate description of this place would be Dr. Seuss gets stuff destined for an industrial landfill and creates a real life Chutes and Ladders game.

Amazingly crazy stuff, man. Cr. A. Zy.

Who looks at a school bus and wonders what it would look like dangling off the edge of a ten story building?

Hanging. Off. The. Building.

And who lets her kid sit in the driver's seat of that dangling bus? Me.

Notice her hair blowing? Now why would it be blowing in the gentle breeze? Could it be because she listened to me when I yelled, 'Open the door! Open the door!' while clapping my hands and jumping up and down?

Yep.

Who looks at a bunch of metal and sees a praying mantis perched atop the city of St. Louis?

Bob Cassilly.

Who took the praying mantis photo from sitting atop the four story Ferris wheel on the roof? Me.

Wow! Whatta view!

So … where do the Chutes and Ladders part of my description come into play? Everywhere (and I mean everywhere) there were things to climb up and stuff to slide down.

Climb up the top enclosed metal tube thing and slide down the bottom.

Climb across this suspended slinky and slide down a most amazing slide.

I went down an eight story curlicue slide and lived to tell about it. I'm pretty proud of that fact. At the bottom of the slide, I was so disoriented that I forgot to snap a photo of it, dang it. In my defense, I ended up in near darkness in a city of caves.

This photo was taken from near the eight story slide. I don't know what to say about it other than yes, that is an octopus' tentacle at the bottom. Expect the unexpected here, people.

I went down another slide and boom! Ended up by a live turtle.

He was groovy.

So was the wall o' wheels.

And this … item. Not really sure what it is. A skinny table top or a bar maybe?

Right after I snapped this photo two lifelong Philly cheese steak eating dudes got a tad bit stuck trying to climb up the giant blue slinky. True story.

Yep, Dr. Seuss turned an old shoe factory into a real life Chutes and Ladders board. It was a weird, funky, and slightly scary place to visit. I highly recommend it. Unless you have an intense fear of heights, giant Slinkys, or rebar. Then you should probably go see the Arch. Pin It Now!