I went back to the Chain of Rocks Bridge a second time, this time in the late afternoon when the light drops low and comes in sideways across the river. The difference from a morning visit is dramatic. The old steel turns warm, the water takes on color, and the Missouri side of the river catches gold in a way that explains why photographers line up here at dusk.
The bridge's name comes from a natural feature of the Mississippi just south of the span — a chain of rocky ledges that created dangerous rapids for river traffic for generations. The name predates the bridge by decades. When the crossing was built in 1929, drivers would have known exactly what those "rocks" referred to.
Walking the mile-plus span at this hour, you get the full effect of the Mississippi. It's wide here — wide enough that the Illinois shore feels genuinely far away. The intake towers midstream, built in gothic brick, catch the last light and look like something from a different era of infrastructure, which they are. The bridge was designed for cars and trucks; those towers were designed for drinking water. Both have outlasted their original purposes by decades.
The bend in the middle is real and strange and worth seeing. Stand at the pivot point and look back toward St. Louis: the Arch rises above the treeline, silver and impossible. Turn the other direction and the bridge runs straight toward a flat Illinois horizon. Two completely different views from the same spot. That's the bridge.