Alton, IL + side trip to Las Vegas – September 20th – October 1st

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Next stop was Alton, Illinois. We found lots of other loopers (~ 20 looper boats) at this marina. One of them, Inked Mermaid, crossed their wake at this marina and were already showing their gold looper flag! We parked the boat in a covered slip next to “Its a Wonderful Life” — how appropriate…

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Our first evening, we took a walk to Fast Eddies — a highly acclaimed local restaurant that had great grill food, beer and live music nightly. They also had slot machines, nice, since we were heading to Las Vegas the next day.

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An interesting thing about Alton is that it is the home of the worlds tallest man, Robert Wadlow – also known as the Gentle Giant. At age 5 he was 5’6″ – taller than Mary is now. There is a memorial in Alton with a life-sized statue of him, his custom sized chair and his replica home. He was 22 years old when he died, and the Taxi driver that took us by told us that he had to enter his home on all fours to get through the small but standard sized doorway.???

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The Old Bakery Beer Company was a micro-brewery that we visited. It was walking distance from the boat and used to be the Colonial bread making factory. The beer was good and so was the bar food.

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We left the boat in Alton while flying to Las Vegas from St. Louis, MO for a 9-day visit . We tried out a new car rental – very good value — and got a convertible for the week. Spent some fun time with relatives at Octoberfest with Mary’s Mom, Uncle John, Aunt Janet, brother Mike and cousins Tammy, Angela and Henry.

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There was a Vegas Knights Hockey Game in town which was also a lot of fun even though we had to wear masks for that indoor event.

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Back at Alton, the farmers market was in town, so we loaded up with some fresh food before taking off that morning.

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