Roaring River

About 30 minutes from our house, in the Mark Twain National Forest, is Roaring River State Park (where we went camping 2 years ago, and where Aaron and I went for a date 3 years ago). We took a little drive a couple weekends ago and ended up over there. We visited the hatchery, fed the fish, threw rocks in the river, played on the playground, checked out the fishing, walked along a couple trails, tried to catch minnows and tadpoles, and explored the spring that supplies the water for the river and hatchery.

This spring produces 20.4 million gallons of water a day, and is the beggining of Roaring River. The water it produces is a constant 57*, which I find sort of amazing because it was a blazing 103* outside on the day we were there. The spring opens up to a cave and in the 90's some divers measured it's depth at 224 feet. In the 70's divers discovered an opening to an underground cave with fresh air.

We have a gift for finding ice cream anywhere we go.

The kids loved the hatchery. I thought it was pretty gross. There are like a billion fish in each of those huge tanks, and when a single kernel of fish food hits the surface of the water, it explodes with fish. They release fish every week into the river (which is why it is so easy to catch them) and we wished we had brought the kids' poles with us so they could fish. We will definitely remember to bring them next time!