Kentucky May 2009

Evan, his parents and I went on a weekend vacation to Kentucky this weekend. It was very nice to get away and see some of the somewhat south. Well, we were far enough south to hear southern accents. Everyone was extremely nice down there, I didn't encounter one rude person at all. But there was a girl talking to me while I was gem sifting and man could she talk your ear off. Overall a very good relaxing and cool time.

Friday we left around 9am, Evan brought me pretty much the most amazing bacon and cheese bagel I've ever had and we were on our way down. Along the way we played Mad Libs. Evan was playing pokemon most of the time and I read and attempted to play a pokemon game until I realized it had second generation characters and I was done with that. I only do the originals. I got to go through Cincinnati and see the Ohio River which was pretty exciting. After we got into Kentucky we stopped at a Big Boy which made me think of Key Club Convention sophomore year and Mrs. Clancy with her freaking Big Boy figurine. I had never been there and from my opinion of the place, they have amazing broccoli cheese soup, but need mayo on their turkey club sandwiches. We then went all the way over to Elizabethtown which was where our hotel was. It is also the birthplace of Abraham Lincoln. Our hotel was on this amazing road that had every restaurant and fast food you could ever want. But their mall was super crappy. It was even worse than Midway. So we checked in and went to the mall to check it out, was there 1o minutes and they didn't even have a bookstore!!! Grr. Then we went to Freeman Lake which is more of a reservoir than a lake. There we saw a cabin that was a memorial for President Lincolns step mother, the Lincoln Heritage House and a time capsule that was burried on the bicentennial of the countrys birth. It wont be opened until 2076. Thats crazy!!! After that we ate at a Sonic a little down the road. I had only been to Sonic once and I love their burgers. This time I got a slushie and was very very happy the rest of the day with its watermelon-y-ness. Back to the hotel after that and Evan, his mom and I went swimming for a bit. Back up to the room and Evan and I talked and watch some TV and then went to bed early.

Saturday was tons of fun. We got up and early, ate breakfast at the hotel and went down to Kentucky Down Under. It's like a little zoo designated to animals of the outback and the aboriginies. Awesome place, but too expensive. First we went on the Kentucky Caverns tour. There was a lot of ducking and squeezing and tight spaces on this one but you felt really accomplished when you made it to the end. When we were about 30 feet away from the door out all the lights had gone off unexpectently. It caused a lot of kids to scream and freak out. We didn't really see much cavelife except for a eyeless crayfish and some cave crickets. When we escaped we went into the outback walk. There I got to pet an emu and a red and gray kangaroo. I freaking love kangaroos!! Then I bought a bag of dirt and sifted for gems. I found a ton in my small bag. Many being rubies but I also found a few peridots, my birthstone.

Following Kentucky Down Under was our Frozen Niagara cave tour in Mammoth Cave National Park. It was a really cool tour. All of the formations looked amazing and we got to see where the cave is making its own natural opening through a sink hole. I also got to see a baby bat and plenty of cave crickets and spiders. I was surprised that the opening of the cave was a revolving door. After our tour we went down the road and went into Big Mike’s Rock Shop. It had tons of stuff for the caves and a 10,000 amethyst rock formation. *Fun fact: Amethyst comes from the Greek word amethusos, which means sober.* We went further down the road and went to Dinosaur World which has huge formations of dinosaurs in their natural habitats. We just went into the gift shop because it was ridiculous to pay $12 to see some big plastic lizards. We then hopped around to different gift shops to various other caves to look around. Evan and I were supposed to go on another tour in Mammoth Cave but we decided not to after we learned the tour was a whopping 2 hours long. That’s waaaay too long. So instead we went down to Bowling Green, KY and ate at Outback Steakhouse. I’m addicted to Outback. Too bad I wasn’t hungry enough to have a steak so Evan and I shared some Aussie fries. We then had a drive back to the hotel. Evan and I then watched Man vs. Food until some little kids got out of the pool so we could go swimming. After we swam we went back up to the room, showered and watched Home Improvement.

Yeah, you really didn’t have to read this. This is more so I have all of my thoughts together so it will be easier when doing journaling for my scrapbook pages. Like an online journal I suppose.

Tomorrow is the David Cook concert. I’m somewhat excited but not as excited as my mom who will be drooling the whole time.