Lake of the Ozarks, MO - Jun. 9 - 13, 2006


On Friday we were headed back to Missouri, and more reasonably priced diesel.  The diesel in Kansas is 15¢ a gallon more than in Missouri. 

We arrived at the beautiful Lake of the Ozarks State Park at about 3:00 PM.  That is when things started to go awry.  The roads in the park are very narrow, and, due to the slope of our reserved spot, we were not able to back in without impaling the RV on the truck rails.  We returned to the entry gate to discover that the Missouri State Park reservation system and the folks at the gate do not have a communication system - no phone or computer terminal - so couldn't easily make a change in site assignment.  Nora, a park employee was extremely helpful.  She took Bill around the park in a golf cart, helped identify a suitable site, and with Susan's cell phone was able to browbeat the reservation desk into changing the site assignment without any additional charge.  Yea Nora!  High-fives around.

Two and one half hours after arriving at the park we were finally parked in our space.  Did I mention it was 95 degrees?  It was definitely time for a beer, a cool down and a little deer watching.

The state park is located on the shores of the very popular Lake of the Ozarks.  The privately developed lake's shoreline has been heavily developed over the last 50 years, however, there are three state parks on the lake that offer an opportunity for relaxing away from the maddening crowd.  One such park is Ha Ha Tonka State Park, noted for its springs, caves and limestone dells and bridges.  The name means laughing waters in the Native American language.  Doesn't "ha ha" mean laughing in all languages?

Within Ha Ha Tonka are the ruins of a 60-room stone mansion, water tower and a 60-horse and 20-car carriage house built by Robert Snyder, a wealthy Kansas City businessman in 1905.  A fire gutted the mansion and carriage house in 1942, but since they were built of limestone the skeletal structure remains.  It reminded Susan of Rochester's Thornfield Estate in Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre. 

Several hundred feet below the mansion are the natural springs for which the park was named.  These springs produce 58 million gallons of pure water a day.  The water flows into crystalline pools then into the Lake of the Ozarks.  While walking along the pools formed by the spring we saw herons, turtles, egrets and a very industrious muskrat.