Ride the rails in 100-year-old passenger cars while you take in a show.

Hey, local day trippers! Obviously, I'm a travel writer and not a singer. But you know who is singing this time of year? Wild elk.

The phrase, "hidden gem" gets thrown around too often in travel writing. It's kind of a pet peeve. But this time, I'll begrudgingly admit that "hidden gem" is a great way to describe Lon Sanders Canyon Conservation Area, in Piedmont, Missouri.

What I thought was a quick lunch stop in Marble Hill, Missouri, turned into an antiquing vortex. I emerged three hours later with disheveled hair and home decor.

Sorry to have to call them out like this, but your cycling friends are holding out on you. Southern Illinois' Tunnel Hill State Trail is famously a cyclist's good time. But adventurers who hoof it can have a little tunnel fun, too.

If you have some kind of weird places-to-use-an-outhouse bucket list, I have great news for you.

Before agriculture became King of the Missouri Bootheel, it was a tangled world of cypress trees and wetlands. Today, only fragments of that wild past remain. This week's destination is Otter Slough Conservation Area.

Tourists spend thousands traveling to Arizona's Havisu Falls and Costa Rica's Rio Celeste in pursuit of water that's a cerulean shade of blue. Meanwhile, we're just sitting over here in Southern Missouri on our goldmine of unsung beauty.

Some days you want a grand, sweat-through-your-shirt adventure. Other days you want to spot wildlife from the comfort of your car's air conditioning. This Semo destination lets you do both.