Travel & Trails

Mom and I went on a trip together. We didn't do the things we planned, but we had a great time.

We picked Ha Ha Tonka State Park because we wanted to see the "castle" ruins. The story of the ruins is pretty cool, though a little bit sad. There is a .4 mile mostly paved trail that goes out to it. You can't go into it or climb on it, but it's neat to walk around and peak through the windows. I wonder if the area would've became a park if the house hadn't burned.

Apparently, Ha Ha Tonka is also home to the 12th largest spring in Missouri. They sprang that on us (haha..see what I did there&  there?) when we stopped in the visitor center. I'm a sucker for visitor centers and I really wanted a Ha Ha Tonka State Park shirt. They only had one shirt that said Ha Ha Tonka, and it didn't come in my size. Apparently Missouri is doing "The Year of the Trail," including a neat challenge issued by the governor to travel 100 miles of trail. That's awesome, cause that's my goal for the year, too! So I bought a hiking medallion for it. I also bought a Ha Ha Tonka medallion.


We planned a backpacking trip on Turkey Penn Hollow trail. We loaded up our packs and headed off on the supposedly 6.5 mile trail. We hadn't been hiking long when it started storming. Around mile 5.5, when we discovered the backpacking camp was after that marker, we decided to go on and hike out. We thought it was only 6.5 miles. Turns out, the mileage doesn't start at the parking lot. The Turkey Penn Hollow trail starts & ends partially down another trail, making the mileage for it a little over 7.5 miles.

Mom says it still counts as backpacking because we did the whole thing with our packs on. :)

Not staying on the trail for the night gave us an extra day on our trip. We went to the George Washington Carver Monument National Park.