Travelrific® Travel Journal
Picture postcards in prose.™ Check out the blogroll on the front page for official merchandise and other resources!Archive for kentucky
Lights Under Louisville
By Linda Tancs
Operating from November to early January, Lights Under Louisville is the world’s only underground drive-through holiday lights display. You’ll find it at Mega Cavern in Louisville, Kentucky. Boasting 7 million points of light illuminating the cavern’s vast spaces, the attraction features themed displays, characters, holiday music, lasers and more. You can drive your own vehicle through the cavern, choose a guided tour on an open-top vehicle, or charter a motorcoach or van.
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Whisky History
By Linda Tancs
Many experts generally acknowledge Kentucky to be the premier whisky-distilling region in the country. So it should come as no surprise that the Oscar Getz Museum of Bourbon History in Bardstown chronicles the history of American whisky from colonial days through the 1960s. The facility is named for liquor executive Oscar Getz (whose private collection became the foundation for the museum), which is located (of all places) in a former Catholic seminary. Its exhibits include an old moonshine still showing the process for making corn whisky and a bottle collection from pre-Prohibition to the present day.
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The Trail that Bourbon Built
By Linda Tancs
Right now almost 11 million barrels of bourbon are aging in Kentucky, the world’s foremost producer. A type of barrel-aged American whisky made primarily from corn, Congress declared it an indigenous product of the United States, meaning that no other country can make a product and call it bourbon. You can trek through the Bluegrass State on a bourbon trail that will take you to 18 distilleries. That’s a lot of sipping and savoring, so put your feet up along the way at a variety of inns and hotels like the Old Talbott Tavern (home to the world’s oldest bourbon bar) in Bardstown, where they’ve been welcoming guests since 1779.
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Quilt City USA
By Linda Tancs
Quilting is, indeed, a thing, especially if you visit Paducah, Kentucky. Affectionately known as Quilt City USA, the locale hosts the National Quilt Museum. It’s fair to say that the facility is a popular attraction, greeting over 100,000 visitors each year. You’ll find quilts from 1980 to the present, over 650 quilts representing 47 states and 12 countries. The smallest quilt measures 3.75 inches square; the largest quilt is 110 inches square. The collection even includes one quilt made entirely of wood. Join them this week for Quilt Week!
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Following the Mississippi
By Linda Tancs
You may have wondered whether you can drive along the course of the Mississippi River. Yes, there’s a road for that. The Great River Road National Scenic Byway follows the course of the Mississippi River for 3,000 miles from northern Minnesota to the Gulf of Mexico, passing through 10 states. Its designation as a National Scenic Byway is in recognition of the route’s outstanding assets in the areas of culture, history, nature, recreation and scenic beauty. The different roads and highways comprising the byway are marked by a green pilot’s wheel logo to keep you on track. Watch for river-related attractions and interpretative centers. You can take in the whole route in 36 hours of straight driving, but why not stretch it out for four to 10 days and enjoy the ride.
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Bluegrass Cuisine
By Linda Tancs
You don’t have to wait until Derby season for a dive into Kentucky cuisine. Enjoy a taste of the Bluegrass State now through October 31 on the Culinary Trail across nine state parks. Each park on the trail is offering a regional meal, including favorites like goetta and burgoo. Pick up your culinary passport at your first stop, and start tasting your way through the state. Then mail your completed passport back to the Department of Tourism for a free gift!
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An Encounter With an Ark
By Linda Tancs
Noah’s ark is the storied vessel discussed in the Bible’s Book of Genesis, built by Noah to save his family and a menagerie from a world-engulfing flood. While scientists debate the existence of the real McCoy at Mount Ararat in Turkey, you can witness your own real-life model of the life-saving ship at the Ark Encounter in Williamstown, Kentucky. The museum features a full-size ark, built according to the dimensions given in the Bible, spanning 510 feet in length, 85 feet in width and 51 feet in height. Built from standing dead timber by skilled Amish craftsmen, the ark contains three decks of exhibits, including life-like animal sculptures. The site also includes exotic live animals from around the world in Ararat Ridge Zoo.
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The Original Sin City
By Linda Tancs
It may be hard to fathom the Bluegrass State’s fair city of Newport as a precursor to Las Vegas’s baptism as Sin City. But so it was. In the 1920s and 1930s, the mob ruled locales like Newport, Kentucky, making millions in casinos, bootlegging and other illicit activities and earning the area’s designation as Sin City. Even the gangsters’ weapon of choice, the Tommy Gun, was invented by a Newport native, John T. Thompson—much to his chagrin, of course, having been developed for use by the military during World War I but delivered too late to be of value then. His historic home, Thompson House, is now an entertainment venue.
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Where Louisville Begins
By Linda Tancs
Situated on 55 rolling acres just six miles upriver from downtown Louisville, Kentucky, Locust Grove is a 1790 Georgian mansion that welcomed a generation of American luminaries, such as U.S. presidents James Monroe and Andrew Jackson, John James Audubon, Cassius Marcellus Clay and explorers Lewis and Clark. A National Historic Landmark, the homestead was built by William and Lucy Clark Croghan. Lucy’s brother, General George Rogers Clark, was a Revolutionary War hero and founder of Louisville. Daily tours offer a step back in time to the early days of Louisville’s history.
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In the Heart of Horse Country
By Linda Tancs
In the heart of horse and bourbon country in Lexington, Kentucky, is Gratz Park. One of the city’s oldest neighborhoods and a historic district, it’s named after early Lexington businessman Benjamin Gratz. Other luminaries who once graced this area north of Main Street include Mary Todd Lincoln, Horace Holley and horseman John Gaines. Colorful houses from the 1800s join stately dwellings like the Hunt-Morgan House, built for millionaire businessman John Wesley Hunt. His great-grandson Thomas Hunt Morgan was the first Kentuckian to win a Nobel Prize for medicine. The home is also the site of the Alexander T. Hunt Civil War Museum, a great resource for Civil War researchers and enthusiasts.
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