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Travel guide
St. Louis
4 days · 8 things to do
Best time to go: April to June, September to October
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Welcome
St. Louis, in a few days
Founded in 1764 by French traders on the banks of the Mississippi, St. Louis raised on its riverfront a 192-metre steel arch, which you climb in five-seat capsules. The rest of the city reveals itself in a park larger than Central Park where the zoo and the art museum are free, a shoe factory turned into a giant playground and a cathedral covered in mosaics from floor to dome.
- Day by day
- D1 Day 1 2 things
- D2 Day 2 3 things
- D3 Day 3 1 thing
- D4 Day 4 2 things
- Worth sorting before you go
- Words that help
- The practical page
- Packing checklist
The trip
Day by day
Map of the sights (numbers follow the suggested order). It prints with the base map.
D1
Day 1
2 things to do · at your own pace
- Morning · Gateway Arch · about 2 hEero Saarinen's 192-metre stainless steel arch of 1965, the tallest monument in the United States, climbed in five-seat capsules to a viewing platform, with a free museum of the West beneath it.
- Afternoon · City Museum · half a dayNot a museum but a giant playground built from salvaged materials in a former shoe warehouse, with ten-storey slides, caves, aircraft linked by walkways and a school bus hanging off the roof.
🛏️ Where to sleep · Hyatt Regency St. Louis at The Arch ↗ · All places to stay by budget →€150 a night
D2
Day 2
3 things to do · at your own pace
- Morning · Anheuser-Busch Brewery · about 1 h 15The historic Soulard brewery where Budweiser was launched in 1876, with a tour of the 1892 brewhouse and the Clydesdale stables, ending with a tasting in the beer garden.
- Afternoon · Missouri Botanical Garden · about 2 h 30The oldest continuously operating botanical garden in the United States, founded in 1859, with the Climatron geodesic dome sheltering a rainforest and one of North America's largest Japanese gardens.
- Late afternoon · The Hill free · 2 to 3 hThe Italian neighbourhood south of Forest Park, with fire hydrants painted green, white and red, delis, bakeries, trattorias and the local invention of toasted ravioli, breaded and fried.
🛏️ Where to sleep · Hyatt Regency St. Louis at The Arch ↗€150 a night
D3
Day 3
1 thing to do · at your own pace
- All day · Forest Park free · a full dayA park of about 530 hectares, larger than Central Park, laid out for the 1904 World's Fair, home to a free zoo, art museum, history museum and science centre, plus lakes and pedal boats.
🛏️ Where to sleep · Hyatt Regency St. Louis at The Arch ↗€150 a night
D4
Day 4
2 things to do · at your own pace
- Morning · Saint Louis Art Museum free · about 2 hA free museum of more than 30,000 works spanning 5,000 years in the 1904 Palace of Fine Arts on Art Hill, strong in 20th-century German art, with many works by Max Beckmann.
- Afternoon · Cathedral Basilica of Saint Louis free · about 1 hBehind its grey granite facade, one of the world's largest mosaic collections, nearly 7,700 m² covered in 41.5 million glass tesserae laid between 1912 and 1988 beneath golden domes.
Before you go
Worth sorting before you go
📶 eSIM data
Online the moment you land, no roaming bill.
Get one · Holafly
Online the moment you land, no roaming bill.
Get one · Holafly
🛡️ Travel insurance
Health, luggage, cancellation.
Cover it · Ekta
Health, luggage, cancellation.
Cover it · Ekta
💳 Fee-free card
Pay at the real rate, with no exchange markup.
Open one · Revolut
Pay at the real rate, with no exchange markup.
Open one · Revolut
🚐 Airport transfer
A private car at a fixed price from the moment you land.
Book it · GetTransfer
A private car at a fixed price from the moment you land.
Book it · GetTransfer
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Good to know
Flavours & local habits
🍽️ Worth tasting
- Burgers and barbecue: brisket and ribs cooked low and slow, done differently in every state.
- Clam chowder in a sourdough bread bowl: the classic lunch on the San Francisco waterfront.
- Mexican food: tacos from a truck in Los Angeles, a Mission burrito in San Francisco.
- Pancakes and weekend brunch: a national habit, generous to the point of excess.
- Craft beer, and California wine from Napa and Sonoma.
⚠️ Best avoided
- Tipping is not optional: add 15 to 20% in restaurants and bars.
- Prices on menus and in shops exclude sales tax, which is added at the till.
- Do not plan more than four or five hours of driving a day: the distances are larger than they look on the map.
- Never travel without health insurance. A night in hospital can cost thousands of dollars.
- In summer, do not hike down into the Grand Canyon in the heat of the day: the climb back out is where people get into trouble.
Getting by
Words that help
🗣️ English is the main language here, so there is nothing to learn by heart.
The essentials
The practical page
CurrencyUS dollar (USD, $)
BudgetAbout €145 a day, mid-range
Best seasonApril to June, September to October
PlugA/B · 120V
Tap waterSafe to drink
Tipping15 to 20%, expected
Emergency911
EntryUK, Australian and most EU passports need an ESTA, applied for online before departure, for stays of up to 90 days; a few EU countries sit outside the Visa Waiver Program and need a full visa. Canadians need neither, only a passport. Anyone who has been to Cuba since January 2021 cannot use an ESTA and must apply for a visa.
HealthNo vaccination required. Keep tetanus, diphtheria and polio up to date; hepatitis A is worth considering if you eat well off the tourist trail. In the desert parks, the heat is the real risk.
Scan to open this guide online, always up to date.
https://offwegooo.com/en/guides/st-louis
Don't forget
Packing checklist
Have a good trip.
Guide made on offwegooo.com · Photos via Pexels · Details are indicative, check before you leave.