St. Louis Union Station — Attraction in St. Louis

I'll start by saying I adore the history and maintained style here. It is beautiful in a way that words absolutely cannot do justice to, and the ceiling light shows in the grand hall are a lot of fun. I would have loved to explore more than I did in my short time here. Unfortunately, I have a number of issues with some things on the grounds.

The layout of the hotel is initially confusing but easy to get used to quickly The rooms are individually quite nice. I liked the layout of the bathroom in my room especially, though the toilet and faucet in the shower both leaked. The room was clean, though, and the bed was very comfortable.

The Aquarium was perfect. It is clean, lovely, and far better/cleaner/friendly than the Shedd in Chicago. The animals all looked happy and well cared for, which was great. The employees were all kind and helpful. This was a great experience.

Every restaurant on the grounds is not well kept. We left the Train Shed after being seated because the table was so sticky that I doubt it had been cleaned at all during that day prior to our arrival. We ended up going across to The Soda Fountain, which had wonderful service but the windows were disgusting and covered in handprints from children, the floors were sticky, the tables looked like they hadn't been cleaned in a week. The food was awesome, thankfully. I wanted to get something to go, but the girls who sat us told us that we were not able to get anything aside from drinks if we wanted to order "to-go." We were also told we were not allowed to sit outside despite a number of people sitting outside with their orders. The grilled cheese and St Louis Standard were great, though.

We later decided to walk around and check the other options on the grounds for things to do. We sat near the koi pond for a bit to watch some of the fire and light shows when they happened, but it was disheartening to see so much algae, so little aeration for HUNDREDS of koi fish in dirty, murky water. There were a number of dead fish on the edges as well, along with pens, garbage, and who knows what else. Koi breed like crazy and it's clear that this pond is not being maintained, which is a shame. There should be far less fish, and far more upkeep. Tetra is being very poorly represented with this installed pond. It is probably not a great idea to let everyone feed them either....it's just too much and too constant.

We headed to the Grand Hall for appetizers and drinks prior to a Cardinals game, which we were assured would be shown on the tv behind the bar. We were there prior to first pitch and spent quite a lot of money while we were in our seats in the room, but during the 6th inning, one of the bartenders switched the game to basketball despite numerous people watching the baseball game. When I asked a bartender why it got changed, a snippy patron said "it was 11-2" and the bartender laughed. We would have gotten tickets and walked to the game if we had known that we would abruptly be treated this way. We were about to order more and continue relaxing and watching the game, but we finished our drinks and left so we could actually see the game. St. Louis doesn't even have a basketball team. The whole thing was ridiculous, and so many people in the room had Cardinals shirts on.

We ended up at the Train Shed restaurant for the remainder of the baseball game, which was on multiple tvs. The bartender here was really nice and funny, and I had no complaints about the bar, but the restaurant is still not one I would have eaten at.

After finishing the game, we originally planned on checking out the ferris wheel, but it was closed. I will say that upon walking over by it to see it earlier in the day, I was wary since the kids working near it (taking souvenir photos, I think?) were extremely rude and unpleasant. They acted like we were not allowed anywhere near them or the wheel and then talked down to us for not having tickets to be anywhere in the area. I wasn't aware that tickets were needed to stand by the ticket...

Our family of seven got tickets for everything. Aquarium, ropes, mirror, selfie, wheel, golf, and carousel.

Aquarium

For the price of the aquarium, I was extremely displeased. Our children had an okay time. Maybe because we have been to many others, our expectations were too high. We did really like the hands-on stuff. My daughter loved the interactive otter and saw her drawing cone to life. The gift shop was expensive, but similar to others. I would overall rate that a 3 because it was nice, just overpriced for what it was.

Mirror maze

Again, we have been too better. Mirrors were really dirty, so it wasn't hard to figure out where there wasn't a mirror. There was nothing noted that you would have to push through a dark tunnel blow up to get out. That was a surprise for us. I'd give it a 2.

Selfie thing

Uhhh, it's my fault for not realizing it was holiday themed. However, the setup wasn't great. It's not worth more than a few dollars per person. I'd give this a 1. Only because it was there, and we did walk through it. We didn't get more than 4? Good photos out of the 7 of us.

Ropes

Overall, this was what we expected. Very well done. The zip line was something we had not done in the past. My older kids really liked it. They were frustrated because it was busy, and it took most of their 30 minutes to wait in line to do it. That part was kinda it is what it is moment, and typical for any high desired opportunities. My 10 year old has done several ropes courses. He had not done a zip before. He went on the first one that goes to a platform, and the only way off that platform is to go down the second zip. He was terrified bawling. There is a door with stairs right on this platform. They didn't want to let him use it as he stood crying for over 15 minutes. My husband and I were frustrated. Eventually, someone let him onto the floor. At this point, he was terrified to move. There was a staff member who came and got me to get to him. Overall, ropes get a 4. The biggest thing there is it took them too long to make a reasonable decision to get him down when there was an easy way. I was a very unhappy Mama.

Wheel

The wheel was clean and nice. The windows fogged up quickly, making it hard to take good photos. I read somewhere that the rides were 45 minutes to an hour. It must have been only for the VIP. I'm not worried about that, but I would have liked to go around for a little longer. It did close early because it was NYE. This was stated on the website. It was a beautiful view. I give the wheel a 4.

Golf and Carousel

Big fat 0. It was stated online that the Wheel was closing early but had the regular times for the other two outside activities. Closing at 9:30/10pm. We rode the ferris wheel at 6:10. We walked over to the area and saw that golf and carousel were shut down before 6:30. They didn't offer to turn the carousel back on, but seeing it dark and off threw of the fun magical part of it anyway. We were refunded for both of those. Appreciate the refund, but my daughter was excited and left disappointed. I have to give it a 0. they shut it down early, and we wasted our time thinking we were going to be using it.

The water fire and lights show didn't work. We purposely planned our day to finish with the outside stuff last so we could experience all of that with the glow of the lights.

The inside, I was so, so disappointed we didn't get access to see any of it. It was closed for a reserved party. I didn't know that was a thing. Had I known, I would have changed days we went. I was excited to see the beauty and appreciate the rich history of the building. Then I read somewhere after we left that you have to be a guest at one of the hotels to see the lights and everything in the grand hall. So very disheartening. I was excited for this to be a good combo of things for our whole family, whose ages are 6, 10, 12, 15, 17, my husband and I. We spent over $500 for the day, and there was not a single WOW moment for anyone.

Staff was truly hit or miss, but nothing ugly stood out, that's good. We will...

I wish I could give this 1 star. I was so excited when me and my family walked into the hotel looking for a unique experience. We walked into our 1st room. Before that when we were in the hallway it smelled like mildew and mold. So we went down to get the suitcases and when we came back we found all sorts of problems with the room. The air filter was disgusting and hadn’t been changed for 6 months. And we also found mold around the mini fridge. When we were checking into our first room we asked for a pullout bed but they said it was a fire hazard. However they must have poor communication or something because they gave it to us anyways possibly endangering us. We went downstairs to change our room immediately. Once we brought our bags upstairs to our new room which was even farther away and very confusing to find. We walked into the room and the hallway smelled better so maybe we got a good room. Once we arrived we thought it would be better but we immediately found more problems. We looked at the air filter which was 5 months old and the bed sheets had stains and were wet because the room was humid and damp. Our mini fridge didn’t close because there was a huge chunk of ice preventing it from being closed. Later we went down to eat and there were 3 places to eat. 2 had a reservation for 1 hour which we could not wait for because it was late and the restaurants would close soon anyways. They even had this for a burger place called soda fountain. The next place called train shed we had to enter through the aquarium even though there were large doors that were unlocked in the main area. Once we entered the restaurant we looked at the menu which didn’t have the kids menu and didn’t have much to offer and outrageous prices. There was mostly alcohol instead of actual drinks like water and we saw kids eating at this place. 40$ for a steak! The carousel was 5$ each for a ticket and 15$ for the Ferris wheel. Due to other conditions along with this we left late because of how bad everything is. I expected better...