No state celebrates Mardi Gras harder than Missouri, and the St. Louis Mardi Gras is second only to New Orleans. The party begins on Twelfth Night in January and continues daily (and nightly) until the festivities culminate on Fat Tuesday.
Part of the Missouri Botanical Garden and Shaw Nature Preserve, the Sophia M. Sachs Butterfly House is located in Faust Park and houses a thousand live tropical butterflies in its glass conservatory. Be overwhelmed with the beauty of the plants and nature's most beautiful insects.
If you love Broadway and outdoor theater, the Muny Theater provides the perfect marriage of the two. The oldest outdoor musical theater in America, Muny Theater grew from a simple clearing between two trees into a gigantic, state-of-the-art amphitheater which hosts an average of seven plays each season.