Sights of Cape Girardeau: St. Louis Iron Mountain & Southern Railway Depot and Trail of Tears State Park

 

St. Louis Iron Mountain & Southern Railway

The train only runs on Saturdays and special occasions but we wandered around the depot and checked out the parked train cars. It has an interesting story and would be a fun excursion for anyone, not just train buffs.



For the would-be engineer!

Trail of Tears State Park

The Visitors Center is only open Friday - Saturday this time of year, but we drove around the camp grounds and by the lake and Mississippi river. Beautiful! What a gem! The tent camping area is separate from the RV area, and very remote in dense woods. Lots of wildlife to see. The RV camping area is along the river with quite a view of the mighty water. The sites are all nice, flat, wide and easy to get into. Some have just electric, some have full hook ups. It is another very scenic area.

I've never done much reading about the Trail of Tears other than the basic information you get in school. Undoubtedly it was a sad era in US history. What I have learned so far is that it was not one trail, but actually several different paths that started in the different southern states and all ended up in Indian Territory, Oklahoma. Several of those trails went through Missouri. All along our travels we see references to stop over points used by the different groups. This has peaked my interest to do further reading!

View of the Mighty Mississippi from the RV campground


Lake Boutin in the State Park
From the Basic campground




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