Tails From Tennessee: Hannibal, MO and the Land of Mark Twain

We we[spent a couple of days in Hannibal, MO checking out the sights and enjoying the area. I had been here about 20 years ago and liked the little town, but decided it was a place in which I could never live. The town had added a few new shopping areas, but it is still a rather dismal place to live, but an interesting place to visit.

I remember a nice quilt shop on Main St called the Hickory Stick. Twenty years ago it was in one of the old, original buildings downtown and was actually housed in 2 separate stores next to each other, It was very dark with the original shelving and woodwork and they carried a lot of reproduction fabrics. I enjoyed my visit there 20 years ago, so I wanted to return. Now they have 3 stores all connected together which means a larger selection of fabrics, but they have now gone more modern in fabric style. Lots of Kaffee and brights. They have brightened everything up with paint and light ceilings to give it a more modern look. I found I could more easily see the fabrics and to find things now, but I did prefer the more traditional look of the original stores. It just fit better with the town itself. They had a nice selection of hand dyed wools, but other than that they pretty much carried the same stuff as other shops. There used to be a nice yarn store on the same street, but it is no longer there.

Like I said, everything was Mark Twain, including the local breweries, which we didn't try.

Hannibal is on the Missouri side of the Mississippi River and the river is much wider and deeper in this section that farther down the river in Memphis.

Just around the corner from Mark Twain's childhood home is a statue of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. There was also a Becky Thatcher Diner and numerous other references to Mark Twain and his characters.

Not far from the campground was a sign that said "Lovers Leap", so we had to turn up the drive and see what it was all about. Here's the story of 2 Native Americans from different tribes.

Beautiful views from Lovers Leap.

When we first arrived at this campground on Saturday it was absolutely packed. There wasn't an empty spot anywhere. We had made reservations well in advance, so we had a spot reserved for us. We noticed there was something going on near the entrance.. There were pony rides, a craft fair, vendor booths and lots of bands performing. When we checked in, the lady said they were having a Hootenanny. Not what I thought a Hootenanny was, but there were hundreds of kids, motorcycles and people in the CG. Evidently it was only on Saturday and by Sunday most everyone packed up and left, thank goodness. Then it was a very nice CG. Very spacious, quiet and the kitties had a great time sitting out in their strollers and taking a stroll around the quiet CG.

Sunday night we decided to take a 2 hour dinner cruise on a Mississippi Riverboat. The food was actually very good, much better that we anticipated and the cruise was nice with live music and nice people. We met a couple from Australia that were headed to Yellowstone after Hannibal.