Visiting St. Louis on the cheap

updated 10:08 a.m. ET March 26, 2009

ST. LOUIS - The French who founded this city in 1764 left instructions for having a good time. The Germans brought the beer, built the brick mansions and got things organized. Henry Shaw, inspired by the gardens of his native England, created a magnificent botanical garden. The Italians gave us The Hill neighborhood of tidy working-class homes and terrific restaurants, bakeries and specialty food shops.

Waves of immigrants who followed — and keep coming — have left their own cultural and epicurean footprints, most notably along South Grand Boulevard, where they transformed a dying urban neighborhood in the 1970s into a vibrant restaurant destination of Vietnamese, Persian, Afghan and Ethiopian cuisine.

The result is a city of bricks and beer, baseball and bowling, history and grand parks, with good eats and abundant cultural offerings. St. Louis is even listed as one of the "50 Fabulous Gay-Friendly Places" to travel and live.

The best part? Most of this can be savored on the tightest of travel budgets.

"People think we're a sleepy town with not much to do," city tourism spokeswoman Donna Andrews said. "When they get here, they rave about the destinations. So many of the cultural attractions are free and world-class. They can have a grand experience here without taking out a loan."

Museum-Zoo tax district
Thanks to a tax approved in 1971 to support cultural attractions, visiting St. Louis' treasured Forest Park is free, including the zoo, art museum, science center and the Missouri History Museum. Depending on the season, Forest Park offers trails, boat rentals, bicycling, golf and tennis; hay rides; ice skating, tobogganing and cross-country skiing. For a buck, you can visit The Jewel Box, an Art Deco greenhouse.

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From May 20 to June 14, bring a picnic for a free, outdoor performance (every night except Tuesday) of "The Merry Wives of Windsor," this season's edition of the annual Shakespeare Festival in Forest Park.

Hop over to the Muny Opera — the nation's oldest and largest outdoor musical theater — by 7 p.m. and get in line for some of the 1,500 free seats available at every summer performance (June 15-Aug. 9).

For more on Forest Park, go to http://stlouis.missouri.org/citygov/parks/forestpark/.

Missouri Botantical Garden
Longtime St. Louisans still lovingly refer to this urban oasis of splendor and beauty as Shaw's Garden, for the British businessman Henry Shaw who recreated the English gardens of his youth in what was then the outskirts of St. Louis. This year, the Missouri Botanical Garden celebrates its 150th birthday. In addition to birthday activities, the garden offers 79 acres of display gardens, indoor conservatories and historic buildings. Admission is $8 (free, age 12 and under). From Memorial Day to Labor Day, it's free on Wednesdays, 5-9 p.m. The free Whitaker Music Festival concert series runs June 3-Aug. 5, 7:30 p.m. Details at http://www.mobot.org/default.asp.

A few blocks south of the garden is Tower Grove Park, an exquisite Victorian walking park that Shaw gave the city in 1868 with pavilions and sculptures, lily ponds, greenhouses, bird-watching trails and some of the 8,000 trees and shrubs he imported from around the world. Enjoy Sunday brunch at Cafe Madeleine in the park's Piper Palm House, 10 a.m.-2 p.m., $19.95 ($9.95 age 10 and under), 314-575-5658.

Gateway Arch
No trip to St. Louis is complete without a visit to the Gateway Arch, Eero Saarinen's 630-foot architectural marvel that commemorates Thomas Jefferson and the nation's westward expansion. Tickets for tram rides to the top are $10 ($5 ages 3-15). Every July 4, the city is treated to a grand, and free, fireworks display under the Arch, http://www.gatewayarch.com/Arch/

Don't miss the nearby Old Courthouse, where slaves Dred and Harriet Scott argued for their freedom in 1847 and 1850. Here also slaves were sold on the courthouse steps, and women's suffrage activist Virginia Minor petitioned for women's right to vote in the 1870s.

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