Visit to our SPECTACULAR IMPROVED BACKYARD -- Forest Park
As you know I am in rehabilitation work on my knee and that will be the dominant fact of my life until Dec. 1st: the day I have designated to end my rehabilitation and call my self ready for normal life.
About two weeks ago my therapist took me out to walk with my cane for the first time. Since then I've been on a walk nearly every day. Until today the major walk was just 2 1/2 blocks up Tamm and down West Park to my brother's gazebo which he's put in the front yard of his lovely home at 6312 West Park. [John invites all folks to use his snazzy gazebo which sits out near the sidewalk as a place to rest and sit. It is delightful and often gets a nice breeze blowing up West Park.]
Today, however, I ventured out. I drove over to Forest Park, near the waterfall which is close to Skinker, or, for those of you who remember the old golf course, just next to the 8th tee of the 18 hole course. I parked there and walked over into the new club house of the revamped Forest Park Golf courses. It is simply spectacular. Lakes, steams, beautiful trees and flowers and a magnificent functioning 9 hole course. (The 18 is still being worked on.)
There is a gigantic fancy restaurant. The main room seated over 100 people. Then next to it is a banquet room that also seats more than 100. Add to that two large outdoor sections, they, in sum also seat more than 100 and you have a gigantic facility.
I then drove over to the brand new boat house, which is exactly where the old one used to be.
Again, I was astonished by the elegance, beauty and size. Unfortunately I was there at 10:30 AM and they don't open until noon (until 8 PM each day, and 1 AM on weekends). But a side gate was open and I went in.
It is very elegant. There is a large comfortable outdoor seating area (at least 50+ seating places) along the water. I sat there resting a while and watched a mother duck and her three tiny ducklings swimming around.
They seem to have three kinds of boats to rent: paddle boats, regular row boats and the other may be, but I'm not sure, a small electric boat. [May 2005 update: nope, no motor boats. Only human powered ones.]
The inside cafeteria was really elegant and seem to seat about 100 folks.
Anyone interested in going there for lunch one day soon?
All of these magnificent improvements to Forest Park simply have to have a positive effect on Dogtown. We are the closest housing community to this treasure of St. Louis, where thousands ride their bikes, skate and walk each day, where tens of thousands flock to the world-famous zoo, and where the rehabbed Grand Basin will very soon make that area below Art Hill one of the most glorious park areas in any city of the U.S.A.
Who wouldn't want to live close to all that. And this report is merely the tip of the iceberg. If you haven't explored Forest Park in the last 6 months you are really missing one of the most lovely places in the entire metro area.
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