Meadowlark Posted November 14, 2015 Share Posted November 14, 2015 We're thinking of taking a vacation there. What are must sees for my age kids? Also, can anyone recommend a hotel with optimum location? Any hotels that could house 7 people? Any tips appreciated if you're familiar with the area. Thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zoobie Posted November 14, 2015 Share Posted November 14, 2015 I can't see your kids' ages on my phone. The City Museum (crazy amazing place) Budweiser factory tour (free) Zoo is decent with free entry, but you pay for certain things and parking. Children's museum When are you going? The Arch is under renovation I believe, but you can check the dates online. You'll need a car in St. Louis. There's really not a central tourist district. We stayed at the Drury near the Arch and were able to walk to the Arch and the Cardinals' stadium. It's parking deck is underneath and insane. I nearly had a panic attack every time we pulled in. If you do a search in here, there are several St. Louis threads with lots of info! :) I posted in a couple closer to when we went (therefore better memory, lol). We really enjoyed it. Affordable, easy to navigate, reasonable prices, lots of good food options, and friendly people. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paige Posted November 14, 2015 Share Posted November 14, 2015 The only hotel I know of that can sleep 7 is the Residence Inn Suites. They have 2 bedroom suites with a pull out sofa in the living room. IIRC, you get 1 king, 2 queens, and a full pull out, so the kids would have to be comfy sharing. The location was good for our needs but not exactly in the center of the tourist attractions. We love St Louis! The City Museum is the kids' favorite, but we also like the science center, zoo, American Girl store, Grant's Farm, and Magic House. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MomtoCandJ Posted November 14, 2015 Share Posted November 14, 2015 My girls loved the City Museum and the zoo :) we also went to Merrimac Caverns Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pawz4me Posted November 14, 2015 Share Posted November 14, 2015 It's been many, many years since DH and I went to St. Louis. He wasn't even DH then, and we sure didn't have any kids with us. ;) But we enjoyed the zoo, the Budweiser tour, the Arch (of course), a riverboat ride and a Cardinals game. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PrincessMommy Posted November 14, 2015 Share Posted November 14, 2015 Also, the Cohokia Indian Mounds. They're in IL, but not far from St. Louis. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beth S Posted November 14, 2015 Share Posted November 14, 2015 Agreeing with these posters. You will find MANY prior WTM threads on this topic, by Googling. Lots of free attractions in Forest Park, especially, which can double as homeschool field trips. Enjoy your trip! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrsMommy Posted November 14, 2015 Share Posted November 14, 2015 When are you planning your vacation? Some things (Grant's Farm, for example) shut down over the winter. Forest Park has lots of great (free) attractions...the zoo, art museum, science center, and Missouri History Museum are all located there. Plus it's a great place to walk around. The Missouri Botanical Garden is amazing any time of year. We go there at least once a month, and sometimes once a week, when things are changing quickly. Grant's Farm is great for children, if you're here in the spring/summer. And if your family likes baseball, there's nothing like a Cardinals game! The Arch is fun, but it is kind of a mess right now. You can still go to the top, but the museum underneath is temporarily closed while they do renovations, and the Arch grounds are also a mess. There's a cool transportation museum in St. Louis County, but I don't know if it closes for part of the year. The Magic House is fun for children, but it gets crazy quickly! There's lots of fun stuff to do here, and depending on when you visit, there are tons of cool festivals, too! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OnTheBrink Posted November 14, 2015 Share Posted November 14, 2015 No one has mentioned the best feature of St. Louis. The new Ikea store! :D 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrsMommy Posted November 14, 2015 Share Posted November 14, 2015 No one has mentioned the best feature of St. Louis. The new Ikea store! :D True! I am, however, waiting until, I don't know, February, to even try to set foot in there. Between the newness of it, and the holidays, I'm scared to even try it before then! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BarbecueMom Posted November 14, 2015 Share Posted November 14, 2015 True! I am, however, waiting until, I don't know, February, to even try to set foot in there. Between the newness of it, and the holidays, I'm scared to even try it before then! We've been twice and going again this week. On a Sunday evening, it wasn't too bad. Friday around lunch time... yowza. There's a reason they have about a hundred parking lot attendants. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OnTheBrink Posted November 15, 2015 Share Posted November 15, 2015 True! I am, however, waiting until, I don't know, February, to even try to set foot in there. Between the newness of it, and the holidays, I'm scared to even try it before then! I went to the special Friends and Family preview day before it opened to the public and it was a MAD HOUSE. But, I felt it was well-handled and even though it was very busy and crowded, we had a great time. One of the staff said Mondays are the least busy days to go. If my house ever sells and we move, I have a big Ikea trip planned for DD's new bedroom furniture. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
6wildhorses Posted November 16, 2015 Share Posted November 16, 2015 We stayed at this home through VRBO when we recently went to St. Louis: http://www.vrbo.com/372470?unitId=372470. It was really great. We were not far from the city, and there was room for everyone to spread out. It's in a really nice neighborhood. We picked this rental partly because it was halfway between the family we were visiting and St Louis, so it minimized our driving. If you search VRBO, you may find something you like better. Having the lake was really great and made this a unique spot. I hate staying in hotels with so many people (6), so we normally use VRBO. There is so much to do in St. Louis: Cahokia Mounds, Lewis and Clark State Historic Site and Interpretive Center (we wanted to go here this summer but ran out of time), Magic House, botanical gardens, zoo (we buy a family membership so we can do everything), arch (hard to get to when we went in July due to renovations but worth it), Laumeier Sculpture Park. I always use tripadvisor.com for ideas. We always eat at the Spaghetti Factory. If I had to pick two places, I would pick the gardens and the zoo. Sometimes the garden has special events. We went to the lantern festival this summer, and it was amazing. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meadowlark Posted November 16, 2015 Author Share Posted November 16, 2015 We stayed at this home through VRBO when we recently went to St. Louis: http://www.vrbo.com/372470?unitId=372470. It was really great. We were not far from the city, and there was room for everyone to spread out. It's in a really nice neighborhood. We picked this rental partly because it was halfway between the family we were visiting and St Louis, so it minimized our driving. If you search VRBO, you may find something you like better. Having the lake was really great and made this a unique spot. I hate staying in hotels with so many people (6), so we normally use VRBO. There is so much to do in St. Louis: Cahokia Mounds, Lewis and Clark State Historic Site and Interpretive Center (we wanted to go here this summer but ran out of time), Magic House, botanical gardens, zoo (we buy a family membership so we can do everything), arch (hard to get to when we went in July due to renovations but worth it), Laumeier Sculpture Park. I always use tripadvisor.com for ideas. We always eat at the Spaghetti Factory. If I had to pick two places, I would pick the gardens and the zoo. Sometimes the garden has special events. We went to the lantern festival this summer, and it was amazing. Ooo...thank you for taking the time to post and link that. My family is CRAZY about fishing and would love that lake. I'm leaning towards renting a house (7 of us) but there's also something nice about being right there in the city close to the action. I'm guessing we will do most of the tourist things like the city museum (people sure do love that place!), the zoo, science museum, and hopefully a Cardinals game. Btw-kids will be 9, 7, 5, 4, 3 when we go. This is our first big vacation and I'm not sure how it will go. I can see the benefit of having a kitchen, but then again, if it's a 20 minute drive to the attractions, we won't be there for lunch or maybe dinner anyway. So renting a house where we can prepare our own breakfast and spread out, OR having a hotel room (or 2), getting free breakfast and location. I guess I'm not sure how easy or hard it is to get around St. Louis. Is it a big deal to get into the city from this house? Were there restaurants and/or grocery stores close by? Sorry for all of the questions-love all of the advice, thank you!~ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
6wildhorses Posted November 16, 2015 Share Posted November 16, 2015 It wasn't too hard to get in and out of the city. Of course, my husband has an advantage in that he grew up nearby, so he knows his way around. Using google maps as you drive helps because it helps you avoid construction and traffic. Avoiding rush hour is a good idea too. We pretty much ate breakfast and dinner at the house and ate lunch when we were out during the day. Sometimes we ate out for dinner before returning to the house. The property is really close to this address: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Bethel+Baptist+Church/@38.6436602,-89.963958,17z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m2!3m1!1s0x88760087eb7a0699:0xf4d63337bb7b779. You can use that location to determine the distance to your planned activities. There are grocery stores within 10 minutes or so. We just stopped by one on our way to the house. Oh, it's also a huge plus to be able to do laundry! We've stayed right in St. Louis before. I can't remember the property name, but we had a view of the arch. It was a great view, but cramming everyone into a hotel room and being in the city (which is loud) was uncomfortable for us. I know some people really love the city, though, so it's really based on preference. Being able to lounge around at the house and enjoy the lake made it more of a complete vacation to us. Plus, we didn't get on each other's nerves too much because we had space to relax after our excursions. My kids went out on the boats and enjoyed having a barbecue. The TV's were nice when the kids needed to unwind. With such young kids, though, the water may add stress for you. My youngest is 9, and all my kids can swim, so it wasn't too much of a concern. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MomtoCandJ Posted November 16, 2015 Share Posted November 16, 2015 We stayed in Fenton because dh had to take part 1 of his CDT test there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StephanieZ Posted November 16, 2015 Share Posted November 16, 2015 MUST DO City Museum. Do it early in the visit, as you might want to go back. :) http://www.citymuseum.org 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Openhearted Posted November 16, 2015 Share Posted November 16, 2015 Purina farms was the highlight of our visit. http://www.purinafarms.com/#/carousel We enjoyed all the attractions previous posters have mentioned, but we still talk about Purina farms. And like a lot of St. Louis attractions, it's free. They do ask you call for a reservation just so they can avoid everyone showing up at the same time. We loved it. St. Louis is one of our favorite places. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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