Gasconde Bridge

I am not one to be super adventurous or do crazy things. However things that I thought were normal when I was a teen scare the bejibbers out of me today. When Kenny and I had our first date he and his friend took me to see a railroad bridge. We drove up the road and in the dark night I could see this massive bridge in the sky. I had never seen anything like it before and was nervous but had to trust that they wouldn't let me die. His friend had walked and ran the bridge several times and so had Kenny. We park up on the tracks (mind you I had no clue it was not a functioning railroad and had been abandoned years ago) I am scared but didn't want to show that on my first date. We walk out a ways and I tell them let me know when we are no longer on solid ground I am not going any farther well we ventured out a ways but no where near the river. The bridge is over half mile long and is 300+ feet up above fields and the Gasconade River.

We didn't cross is that night but part of me wanted to just so I could say hey look what I did. A few months later we were riding around with a group of friends and went out to the bridge and they talked me in to crossing it. Which was totally stupid but at the time I didn't realize how dangerous it could be, you would be walking and would come across a spot with 2 or 3 railroad ties missing and you would have to jump to the next one. I have no clue how long it took us to cross it that night but I did it.

A few years back Kenny and I decided to go see the bridge in the daylight as both of us had only ever seen in at night or from the river below. We walked out on it and right then I thought how on earth had no one fell off or thru this thing. Ties were rotted and missing or almost gone. There are no rails nothing to hang on to you are just out there on railroad ties way up in the air. We wanted to get some pictures of the bridge from the ground and then up on it but the people who own all the land around the bridge fenced the road off and you can no longer get there only by water. Today I was looking on line to see if I could find any pictures and I found some...

This is the view from the field below the bridge. I so wish there was a way to get a picture of it at night with a clear sky because its breath taking to see it.

Very nice view of the whole bridge, river and surrounding farms.

Here is all you can see as you are crossing the bridge, however at night its a bit more frighting this looks to be about halfway across.

Here you can see how deteriorated the bridge has become over the years. I was always worried if the tie we were jumping to was sturdy enough to hold us.

And here is the plaque that states when the bridge was constructed and who built it. Apparently its the longest railroad bridge in Missouri. There isn't much online that talks about this particular bridge guess since its no longer in service.