Once back onto I-24 we decided to make a stop at the town of Paducah to take a look around. Paducah is a very quiet town with a downtown area that is filled with antique shops, restaurants, and small businesses. It sits at the confluence of the Tennessee and Ohio Rivers and being a river town, it floods quite frequently. In response to the floods the town built a levee system which is painted with beautiful giant murals depicting the town's history. Morgan, Hank, and I walked the levees and downtown area until we came across a bakery called the Kirchhoff Deli and Bakery. It was there that we found lunch of delicious feta/spinach pin wheels, cheddar bagels, a brownie, and a slice of pumpkin cheesecake. If you are ever in the area or passing through we definitely recommend making the stop.
We continued on the road until coming to Champaign, IL where we stopped for a quick visit to see Morgan's birth mother, Barb. Morgan's mother was unable to have children so Barb, who barely knew Louise and Tom(Morgan's parents) at the time, so graciously offered to be a surrogate mother for Morgan and Broegy(Morgan's brother). She is a very amazing woman and meeting her was fantastic. It is fun and interesting to see the similarities and differences between Morgan and his three parents.Afterwards, we continued on the road, hoping to make it to Amherst by the end of the night AND, we did! Unfortunately this meant no City Museum in St. Louis, MO for us on this trip. We found out that they are not open Mondays or Tuesdays during the winter and we weren't excited about having two more frozen nights in the car. So we decided we will have to get there another time.
After a 17 hour day, 10 of which were actual driving hours, we pulled in a little before midnight to be welcomed by Morgan's lovely family and their beautiful Christmas lights!
