Achievement Hunters

2016-17 marks the 100th anniversary of the Missouri State Parks system.  As part of the celebration, they've rolled out a passport with a space for a stamp for each of the 88 state parks and historic sites.  The first 1000 people to complete get a backpack, and everyone who finishes my 10/31/2017 gets entered in a drawing for an unspecified prize package.

These awesome little books are $5 at any staffed park or site, and they have a $5 Bass Pro coupon (on an expenditure of $50 or more) so you can make your money back pretty quick.  Even if you're more REI than BP, it's worth the $5.  We bought ours before we realized we couldn't take the dog to the shut-ins, and when we got the bad news... We may have overreacted.  We took off, trying to hit as many sites in two days as possible.  It's not really about the backpack, it's about seeing these places and meeting the other crazy people who've decided to play what we like to think of as ultimate pokemon go.  Or, as our antipokemon if you will.

This is a pretty big departure from our initial premise, so I apologize if you came here looking for one thing and got another.  Many, many of these parks do fit the One Tank Ethic, but in our desire to reach all 88... we've had to refill the tank a few times.

The other consequence of this is we've been so busy bagging parks that we barely have time to write about them.  We'll get some words out as soon as possible, but the weather is too awesome to sit inside right now.