Saturday, May 14, 2016

Day 36 -- Georgetown to Fort Boonesborough State Park, Kentucky -- 40 Miles

Today marked our 36th day on the road and, as Concetta is fond of telling me, if we don't move a little faster then our recent 50 miles a day, we won't get home until just before Christmas. Today she was hoping that I would set our course eastward toward the West Virginia/Kentucky border, but I still had a couple of Kentucky tricks up my sleeve. Not wanting to let ol' Abe Lincoln slip behind us, I planned for a "brief" visit to the Mary Todd Lincoln house in Lexington, Kentucky, followed by a short drive further south for another "brief" visit at Boonesborough, a place I've wanted to see since I was a child.

Naturally it rained last night and this morning at our camp near Georgetown, Kentucky. Yesterday it was absolutely beautiful, but today dawned gray and drizzly. Fortunately, by the time we had eaten breakfast and straightened up the rig, the light rain had tapered off to nothing and I was able to break down the sewer and water hoses, as well as the electrical cable without getting soaked. In reality, we didn't care about the weather so much this morning since we planned to be inside for the Todd house tour anyway.

We were fortunate when we arrived in Lexington for the Todd house tour as the city had thoughtfully provided an absolutely HUGE parking lot for visitors. We even were able to find a level spot. The weather still looked gloomy, and the temperatures didn't invite much outdoor walking, but the Todd house was warm and cheerful. By the time we arrived we had missed the 10:00 o'clock tour, so we had an opportunity to get to know the receptionist and one of the docent guides for about twenty minutes. They both proved just a joy to talk with.

Before long, it was our turn to tour the house and by then another half dozen visitors had arrived. Our guide's name was Robert Wright, of the Dayton, Ohio Wrights. And yes, he said he was distantly related to that other famous American family so dear to the folks in Dayton. It was hard to believe that Robert hadn't been born in Lexington, as he was so lyrically soft-spoken you could have sworn he was a southerner.

Ohio native or not, Robert knew his Todd family history. He told us how Robert S. Todd purchased the house in 1832 and turned it into a residence. Before that the building had been a stage station for over a quarter century. Mary Todd was born in Lexington in 1818 and spent many of her formative years in the house. Her father, Robert, not only provided for his daughter's education but also fostered her interest in society and politics since he was a prominent businessman and politician himself.

After Mary's marriage to Abraham Lincoln in 1842, Mary would bring Abe and the children to Lexington on visits. During these visits Lincoln witnessed slavery first-hand, not only within the Todd household, but perhaps at slave auctions at the nearby courthouse, events that may have helped formulate his opinions on slavery that would guide his actions in the future.

Personally, I often find that historic house tours can to be quite similar, and therefore I don't normally get very excited about them. Concetta tells me she feels the same way. Whether it's a plantation in the south, or a federal-style house in the north, the furnishings are largely the same and all begin to blend into each other in your mind. But today we found that the Todd house was an exception. Though a large percentage of the furnishings are representative of the era, many pieces on display are the actual family heirlooms.

There are a number of reasons for the quality of the furnishing displays. First of all, when Robert died in 1849, he had not done a legally-witnessed will. Therefore, all of the family possessions within the house were auctioned off. To do that, the auction company formulated a detailed descriptive list of everything to be sold. This allowed the Kentucky Mansions Preservation Foundation, who now own the house, to recreate all of the furnishings with period-accurate items using the auction list. And, once the foundation began restoration in 1969, people began to come forward with actually pieces of the Todd furnishings that their various ancestors had purchased at the auction in 1849.

As the eight of us moved from room to room, Robert Wright described in detail each and every item in the room and told us whether it was original to the house, or was a period-correct antique. We began to feel a certain bond with the family that comes from seeing their actual possessions on display. Also present in the house were items from the Presidential White House that Mary had received permission from the new President, Andrew Johnson to retain after her husband had died. One example of this are the beautiful candelabra set that we saw on the Todd family dining room table (photo lower right).

The miracle of the Todd family house was that after the Todds had lost it, the house went through a succession of owners and often non-residential uses. By 1969 the house had deteriorated so badly that it was slated for demolition. Had not the Governor's wife and first lady of Kentucky at that time, Mrs. Beula C Nunn, stepped in, this historic treasure would have been lost. Mrs. Nunn not only prevented the destruction, but spearheaded the restoration and refurbishment efforts.

The thing that Concetta and I liked best was being in a house that had felt the touch of our favorite President, Abraham Lincoln. His hand, as did ours, felt the silky smoothness of the banisters; his feet trod the soft-wood floors; his eyes gazed upon the guest room portrait of his then lovely wife. It just makes your heart beat faster to contemplate it.

It was with a great deal of regret that we finally reached the end of our tour, though we did tarry for a time in the gift shop and I talked Concetta into buying the book on CD entitled "Manhunt: the 12-day hunt for Lincoln's Killer," so we can listen on one of our long drives through the countryside.

After we left the Todd house we dashed over to the nearby cemetery because our guide, Robert, told us that they were very helpful in finding one's ancestors. The cemetery was only a block away and easy to find, and moments later we were wheeling in the front gate opposite the Gothic-style office building. It took some doing to find a place to park the RV since the office parking lot, at the time, was full of automobiles. We saw a sign that said "turn here for bus parking," but we didn't really see a large area in which they expected you to park your "bus." So, in frustration I just violated the cemetery rules that said to keep vehicles off the grass, and rolled the rig into a sort of half grass/half blacktop position, and stopped.

Exiting from the rig with my notebook and pen in hand, I walked back to the entrance and right up to the office door. But when I attempted to twist the knob, I found it locked. Right next to me was an outdoor computer terminal that you could use to call up the cemetery database, but it was out of order. Batting a thousand, I turned to leave and saw two gentlemen standing nearby in conversation. I approached and asked if they knew why the door was locked. "They only work until twelve noon on Saturdays," one of the men said. Just my luck, I thought. It's not like I can return on Monday.

Making my way back to the rig, I discovered that Concetta and spent her time getting sandwiches made for our noontime meal, and so we proceeded to have a nice picnic lunch in the middle of a cemetery, a very gloomy cemetery that could have used a bit of cheery sunlight I thought. Still, we found it to be a nice quiet lunch hour. And, although two different cemetery maintenance trucks rolled past while we parked on their grass, no one came to the door to demand that we get the heck out of there.

Once lunch was over, the second half of my plan for the day came into play. Just 22 miles away, I told Concetta, was the not-to-be-missed, historic "jewel" of Kentucky called Boonesborough. I'm sure lots and lots of you watched Fess Parker and Ed Ames, as Daniel Boone and Mingo, in the old 1964 TV series about Boone and Boonesborough. I mean, as a kid at the time, I would dream about getting to go there someday. Well, today was my day!

Anyway, Concetta didn't object so off we went. The skies were still gloomy, and there didn't seem to be any reason to hope for any great photography, but having read the tourist information booklet, I knew that there would be ample opportunity to talk to docents who would be demonstrating 18th century arts and crafts, something that we both just love.

From the web I learned how Boonesborough came about: "Richard Henderson, founder of the Transylvania Company (a sort of real estate group) in 1775, chose Daniel Boone to head a party of 31 axe men to clear a path through the Cumberland Gap (southeastern Kentucky) that would run from Long Island of the Holston River, Tennessee, to Otter Creek of the Kentucky River."

"Blazing the trail presented extraordinary difficulties – the route through the wilderness was a hunter’s trace that was too narrow for a wagon. The task was to combine many trails into one continuous route by clearing underbrush and overhanging foliage. For some stretches however, it meant using axes and tomahawks to clear trees for a new section of trail. It was very expeditiously but roughly done."

"For decades afterwards, the Wilderness Trail was generally conceded to be the roughest, most disagreeable road on the continent, but was one of the major factors in the opening of the Middle West to colonization. A determined Boone and his loyal followers forged ahead until they reached the settlement site “about 60 yards from the river, and a little over 200 yards from a salt lick.” On the first of April, 1775, Boone and his woodsmen began the construction of several temporary log huts that were immediately dubbed 'Fort Boone.' The name would later be changed to Boonesborough."

The modern-day re-constructed Fort opened in 1974 and is just a wonderful representation of the cabins and block houses of the original fort. After watching a great movie about Daniel Boone's life, we wandered the Fort grounds talking to the various docents who were involved in a number of different crafts including spinning, soap making, candle making, gun smithing, and dietary recreations. In addition, I spent some time talking to Larry as he was cleaning the barrel of a Kentucky-style, flintlock rifle.

After Larry finished he asked me if I would like to try throwing an Indian tomahawk. Although I had failed miserably to hit the target when I tried tomahawk-throwing in the past, I readily agreed to sign the permission slip and give it another try. Once the official paperwork was done, we headed for the throwing ground. Thankfully, Larry didn't demand that I stand halfway across the fort's interior to throw the thing. We actually stood fairly close, less than twenty feet away I expect. Still, I can say with pride that I threw that lethal Indian weapon at least eight times and I stuck it in the target almost every time. Now I'm going to have to buy myself one of those so I can practice some more.

Our last stop for the afternoon was to visit with a chap named Robert Caudill, the gunsmith. It turned out that we soon recognized that Robert was perhaps the most talented docent in the fort. He hand made Kentucky-style long rifles using, he told us, no power tools whatsoever! His workmanship looked superb! We spent at least a quarter hour with Robert and asked him every question we could think of about guns, gunsmithing, blacksmithing, and life on the frontier in general. He seemed to have a complete handle on the pioneer life.

I was so impressed with Robert I couldn't dream of letting him get away. I figured that if I had his email address or the address of his web site that I would be able to ask him questions in the future. But Robert said, "Don't have any of that stuff."

"No email," I repeated, I'm sure sounding incredulous.

"Nope," Robert said. "I live in a log cabin. I don't have any modern conveniences of any kind."

I'm sure that both Concetta and I stared open-mouthed at him at that point. "A real log cabin?" Concetta asked.

Robert nodded and said, "Which means no phone, no electricity, nothing."

At that point Concetta asked him if he had a hand-made rocker for his cabin porch.

"Sure do," Robert said. "Made it myself."

"I sure love those old Kentucky rockers," Concetta said. "We saw one at the Buffalo Trace distillery."

Naturally, I didn't want to talk about rockers. I said, pointing to a large, heavy musket over the fireplace, "Is that one of those British muskets?"

"Yes," Robert said. "It's a Brown Bess. The British made boatloads of those things and brought them to America. Just about everyone had one at some point or another."

"Heavy bugger," I said.

"About fourteen pounds," Robert said.

"Sure would hate to have to carry that thing all day long," I said, just trying to prolong the conversation until I could think of even more questions to ask this brilliantly talented artist. But at some point the conversation trailed off and we had to say our goodbyes. I was never so sorry to see another human being get away from me. I would just love to be able to go to Robert's house once in awhile and pick his brain about the pioneer days. Such skilled historians are rare indeed.

Before we left Robert I did ask him if he knew where we might park the rig for the night and he told us just to turn right out the front entrance, drive just a mile or so down the road, and we'd see the Fort Boonesborough State Park. We did just that and now sit quite comfortably amidst dozens of other campers in a very pretty setting next to the Kentucky River. Our day was just astoundingly wonderful, full of history and talented historians, and if I never experience another day like this, I'd still go away happy. Thankfully, I hope that won't be the case, for tomorrow we're headed sort of east toward Virginia and I suspect that a whole new spectrum of adventures await. So until that day, we wish you Happy Travels!

Friday, May 13, 2016

Day 35 -- Herrington lake to georgetown, kentucky -- 50 Miles

If the State of Kentucky was a giant sponge, it would be at a point where you'd have to go find a new sponge because this one is so water-logged that it just can't absorb ANY MORE WATER! Everywhere you put your foot -- lawns, gravel paths, or wherever -- you hear a squishing sound and water seeps out around the edges of your shoe. Last night, when we pulled into our camp at Herrington Lake near Harrodsburg, it was raining, though as usual it quit just long enough to let me set up, then started in again. Later, when Concetta ventured over to the laundry room to run a load, I had to take one of our umbrellas and go rescue her before she could come back. Seriously, it's getting downright ridiculous and we're beginning to think that summer has been cancelled for some reason and we're in a springtime holding pattern until the snow falls.

BUT TODAY!!!!! Today was just astoundingly beautiful. Just a few fluffy clouds scudding along, not congregating menacing masses, or in any way threatening to turn dark on us.

We couldn't believe it.

Plans today called for a run northeast toward Frankfort so we could visit the famous Buffalo Trace Distillery. At one point, as we drove up Route 127, we passed a roadside marker announcing that we were in the neighborhood of a Shaker Village on Route 68. Only 4 miles off our route. Most likely a visit to a Shaker village would have been heavenly as the weather was perfect for outdoor photography. But after doing two frontier forts yesterday, we decided to stick to our plan and bypass the Shakers this time.

The GPS didn't fool around and delivered us right to the door at Buffalo Trace. Initially, I didn't see any place to park the RV, so I just motored over to where the 18-wheelers were sitting while they waited their turn to unload, and backed her right in. But when I checked with the lot attendant, he requested that I move the rig around to the south of one of the big barrel houses and park it beside the road over there. When we did as he asked we found a line of specialty vehicles including a couple of vans, a tourist bus, and a stretch limo over there. If we kissed up close to the barrel house, there was enough room to allow traffic unfettered use of the road without endangering our paint job. We did set the step that automatically pops out when you open the door to NOT pop out this time.

We had arrived at the distillery just about lunchtime, but we didn't stop to eat as Concetta was hopping to sign up for the Cooperage Tour which we hoped would still have reservations available. But we had already been a little dismayed by the number of cars in the parking lot, and when we reached the visitor center we encountered so many people that we suspected that our chances of getting a spot on the Cooperage Tour were slim. Soon the visitor center check-in lady confirmed our suspicions that we would have needed to sign up more than a month ago to get that particular tour. Well, no matter, we could still go on the general tour which we almost immediately were able to do.

Our tour guide spent the next hour giving us a general education about Bourbon. "First of all," he said, as the saying goes, "All Bourbon is whiskey, but all whiskey isn't Bourbon."

We and our fellow tour members, perhaps forty people, perked up. The guide went on, and told us that to qualify as a Bourbon it first of all has to be made in the United States. Then, a number of other qualifiers come into play. He told us he uses the ABC method to explain what's actually in Bourbon. The "A" stands for additives, which for Bourbon have to be all natural. He mentioned only several: rye, malted barley, and yeast. The "B" stands for the barrels which are made of white oak and are charred on the inside for a number of seconds each. Finally, the "C" stands for the main ingredient in Bourbon, the corn. To be considered Bourbon there must be at least 51% corn. All the ingredients are fermented together for three to five days.

Though we didn't get to go on the Cooperage tour, I did wander over to the barrel house by myself at one point and no one threw me out. I took a couple of photos of the barrels and noted a sign that said I was standing in the building where the incoming barrels where quality checked before being sent to take their places in the barrel houses. As was pointed out during our tour today, the barrel staves must be adequately aged before they're considered for barrel making, otherwise they'd shrink and cause the barrels to leak.

They use white oak because it's very strong and it seems to provide the best flavors. They char the barrels to lend color as well as flavor to the bourbon. I noted in the barrel house that they char barrels for varying lengths of time from 20 seconds to 45 seconds, but there was no one around to tell me about that. From Wiki I learned that "Bourbon Whiskey barrels are typically charred for 40 seconds to 1 minute, but some distilleries have experimented with charring times of up to 3-4 minutes."

All the Bourbon at Buffalo Trace ages from four to twenty-three years our guide told us. And we learned that where the Bourbon barrel is stored in the barrel house determines how swiftly the Bourbon ages. Barrels stored near the top of the barrel house mature more quickly as they are exposed to extremes of temperature. In warm temperatures the liquid migrates into the charred oak more readily, and when it's exposed to cold temperatures the liquid migrates out of the oak. Barrels stored on the bottom of the barrel house experience the least amount of temperature swings and therefore need the longest time to age. We were told by our guide that sometimes a barrel slated to age for a longer period of time -- like 23 years -- must be pulled early when the technicians determine it's ready. Were it allowed to age more the Bourbon would actually deteriorate.

Again from the web I learned that: "The Bourbon barrels are used only once by law, which creates an incredible supply of them. A lot of them head to Mexico for tequila to age in, as well as Scotland for scotch to be aged in. Until recently, there wasn’t a huge demand for them, and then they started being sent to breweries for beer to be aged in, imparting the delicious flavors of the former tenant to the new beer. From there, everything from bitters to coffee beans to tobacco have been stored in used barrels, even maple syrup and sherry vinegar."

The most interesting thing about the distillery we toured today is that during prohibition -- 1920 to 1933 -- the Buffalo Trace operation was one of only four in the entire country that was allowed by the U.S Government to continue to operate and to produce spirits used, as our guide informed us, for "medicinal purposes only." Obviously, someone had considerable pull with certain senators and representatives.

Of course no distillery trip would be complete without the tasting room, which is why most of our fellow travelers came on the tour in the first place. Once the tour was over, we all gathered in the second floor of the visitor center and were offered three out of five possible samples. We could have one of two clear liquors, a vodka or a "White Dog," which is a 125 proof, non-aged Bourbon. We could have one of two aged Bourbons, Eagle Rare or Buffalo Trace Kentucky Straight Bourbon. Lastly, everyone could have a sample of the Bourbon Cream, which is much like Baileys Irish Cream, but is made with real cream and must be refrigerated after opening. Concetta and I tried both of the aged Bourbons and the Bourbon Cream, and I also tried the "White Dog." As an added attraction, each participant was offered a Bourbon Ball candy, which was just wonderful.

So that's it for our "adult" field trip today. It's always so interesting to explore areas that you don't ordinarily get to see. You can read all you want about producing Bourbon, if you're not smelling the smells, and tasting the tastes, and talking to the key figures, you're probably missing the biggest part of the Bourbon experience.

After our distillery adventure, we bought a few souvenirs, then set our course for our evening camp just a few miles distant near the town of Georgetown. Once we arrived we were just elated to see that we had found a professionally-run camp, with lots of room between rigs, wide drive areas for swinging wide turns, and a nice, picturesque lake full of ducks as a backdrop. Concetta checked out the laundry room in hopes of doing the towels and bedding and we lucked out and found no one there. So, we've done the lion's share of the laundry, we've had cocktails under the awning, we enjoyed a delicious steak dinner, and now we're set to kick back for awhile before bedtime.

Tomorrow we have no set plans other then I'd like to explore around Lexington where Abraham Lincoln's wife, Mary Todd was raised, and perhaps look for one or two counties where the Jones family may have landed when they came from Pennsylvania (if I've settled on the right Jones family). But whatever happens, you know it will appear here, so stay tuned. We wish you Happy Travels!

Thursday, May 12, 2016

Day 34 -- Elizabethtown to Lake Herrington, Kentucky -- 145 Miles

Today we had no intention of getting much of anywhere, well, at first we did. At first we intended to make the Buffalo Trace distillery somewhere up around Lexington. But as the morning wore on and we drove further and further in the opposite direction we needed to go to reach Lexington, we revised our itinerary on the fly.

Today was the day we wanted to visit a couple of the earliest settlements in Kentucky. And when I say early I'm talking Daniel Boone early. The first town we wanted to visit was at first called Logan's Station, then became St. Asaph, and finally, when the settlement became a tad more refined, it took on the name of Stanford.

Logan's Station, a sort of fort but without being totally enclosed by walls, was founded by a chap named Benjamin Logan. It was established way back in 1774. Back then the only humans who had any legitimate claim to the Kentucky wilderness were a handful of native American tribes who lived across the Ohio in what would become the states of Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio. All the tribes considered Kentucky their very private hunting ground, and anyone caught trespassing there often discovered much too late that Kentucky was a very dangerous place to take up farming or any other pursuit in those days.

That's why Benjamin Logan and other intrepid frontiersmen, willing to brave the Kentucky wilderness in the 18th century, would most often establish a central fortress that would be manned by men from the surrounding farms in time of trouble. When things were quiet, the settlers would clear the distant land of trees, plant crops, and begin to establish a new life for themselves.

But when news reached the fort of the approach of a war party, runners would be dispatched to warn the outlying farms that everyone needed to come to the fort. Sometimes news of a war party wasn't received until they were seen crossing the Ohio. And sometimes settlers didn't hear about their approach until an outlying farm was attacked, the farm buildings burned, and the unfortunate farmers murdered or carried off into captivity.

I began studying Logan's Station in an effort to learn more about the presence of my mother's father's ancestors who came to Kentucky, probably shortly before or shortly after the American Revolution. Their family name was Jones and, unfortunately for me, that family name turns up in Kentucky in a number of different geographic locations around the same time. My 3-times great grandfather may have been at Logan's Station, and he may not have. There is a John Jones listed as being part of Logan's band of militiamen, but I have no idea if he belongs to me. The reason is that at the same time there are also Jones family members living near Louisville on the Ohio River, and more near Lexington.

Not wanting to pass up any opportunity to see where my ancestors MIGHT have lived, we made Logan's Station our first destination of the day. Picking out this particular destination allowed us to spend a very pleasant morning cruising the Martha Layne Collins, Blue Grass Parkway, which was a beautiful and lightly-traveled divided highway from Elizabethtown to the outskirts of Lexington. We got off at the intersection of the Parkway and Route 127 and drove south toward Logan's Station, now called Stanford.

It took us until almost noon to reach Stanford. We stopped on the outskirts of town to photograph the historic marker for the old Fort, then we cruised down the hill and into the historic section that looked pretty old, but not much like a frontier station. We didn't see any mention of the historic fort on main street, if one still existed at all. So we found a nice place to park next to a cinder-block warehouse on Main Street that looked like it hadn't been open in a few years, and turned off the engine. It was time for a bit of lunch.

While Concetta was doing the lunch prep, I did a little sleuthing and discovered that the old Station had once stood just a block west of the courthouse. I remembered passing the court house and there was now a row of buildings to the west of the ancient brick structure. At that point I resigned myself to not being able to stand on the actual ground where my ancestors might have stood. I put the computer away, we had our lunch, and I reconciled myself to moving on to the next point of interest on our list.

But there was one more thing left to do before leaving town. We had to fill the gas tank. I never actually allow the gas tank to get empty. When the level drops to half full, I begin to scout for a handy filling station. Since we were on the half mark I wheeled into the first station I came across and squeezed into a tiny establishment right on main street in the middle of town.

The first thing that happened was a young chap of about 25 ran out and began helping me with the gas pump. This sudden maneuver sort of caught me by surprise, and I must admit I was a tad short with the fellow. But when I realized he was just trying to help me, I smoothed things over with him, found out his name was Gary, and we began to chat about this, that, and the other thing. At some point I got around to asking him if there was anything left of Logan's old fort or station.

"Sure," Gary said brightly. "It's just out of town a bit."

I immediately perked up and said, "like right near here?"

"Absolutely!" Gary turned and looked up the street the way we'd been heading. "You just go up main street here, then take a left on Martin Luther King street. It's not far at all."

Incredibly, we had seen Martin Luther King Street earlier when we'd stopped to photograph the Logan's Station historic marker. "That's great," I said. "I know right where that is."

So, once the tank was filled and I'd said goodbye to Gary, we rolled on down Main Street, turned left on MLK Street, and before long were bumping and bouncing down a much neglected road on the outskirts of Stanford. Soon the pavement ended and we came abreast of an old garage that had a sign posted proclaiming itself the "Logan's Fort Visitor Center." Trying to avoid the deepest of the mud holes and ruts around the center, I parked and was halfway out of my seat when Concetta pointed out that the building sure looked deserted to her. "And," she went on, "it has a giant padlock on the front door."

I stopped exiting the truck at that point and focused my attention on an orange-shirted fellow running a riding mower nearby. He was swiftly and skillfully cropping all the grass on the south side of the muddy track where we sat. Deciding on a new mission, I jumped down and headed for the mower guy. "Why don't you talk to the guy in the pickup truck?" Concetta called after me.

That was the first time I'd noticed that there was an actual person in the cab of the nearby Ford Ranger pickup. He appeared to be asleep and had slumped so far down in the cab that only the top third of his head showed above the side window. I really didn't want to disturb his nap, but I was sort of desperate to find out if the steep, rutted road just beyond the pickup was going to accommodate our thirty-one foot rig.

When I reached the pickup window the driver still hadn't stirred, so I did the old throat-clearing routine and he opened one eye, saw me, and pushed himself vertical in the seat. "Howdy," I said. "I was just wondering if this is the road to Logan's Fort."

The guy nodded, smiled, and said "Yes it is. You just go up that road another quarter mile and you're there."

Relieved to see he wasn't angry with me for interrupting his nap, I said, "Do you think I can get that RV up there?"

He smiled some more. "Sure! Do you want me to lead you up there in the pickup?"

"That would be great," I said, not exactly certain how that would help me. I think he just wanted something to do since watching the other guy mow the lawn must have been way boring."

And so the young man drove ahead of us up the rocky, rutted road and I tried as expertly as I could to avoid the worst of the ruts and the mud holes. Before long we'd arrived at a structure that resembled a movie set fort in a lot of ways since it was only the front wall and two block houses. We all got out and the young man explained that in just another week local re-enactors would be using the mock-up fort for some staged frontier battles in celebration of the town's early history. But we could go ahead and have the place to ourselves, even go into the block houses if we wanted.

After that the guy was off to supervise the mower guy (who turned out to be an inmate) and we spent a few moments walking around the structure taking photos. It was a little disappointing that the town of Stanford seemed to have put a minimum of effort into their fort, but perhaps someday they'll complete things.

After our Logan's Fort visit, we jumped back on Route 270 and headed back the way we had come earlier in the day. Our next stop was the old Fort at Harrodsburg, what we would later learn from docents was considered to be the very first settlement in Kentucky. From the wiki we learn that: "Harrodstown (sometimes Harrod's Town) was laid out and founded by its namesake James Harrod on June 16, 1774. The settlement was abandoned later the same year as a result of Native American attacks, but it was resettled a year later in 1775. Fear of attacks from the Native Americans during the American Revolutionary War left it one of only three settlements in Kentucky after 1777, along with Logan's Fort and Boonesborough. Also known as Oldtown, Harrodstown was the first seat of Virginia's Kentucky (1776), Lincoln (1780), and Mercer (1785) counties upon their formations. It remains the seat of Mercer County in Kentucky."

If Concetta and I were disappointed with the effort made to reconstruct Logan's Fort, we were just totally in awe of the effort put forth in the reconstruction of Harrodsburg. There, a somewhat smaller version of the original fort has been modeled in its entirety. The palisades, the block houses, the interior cabins, all have been expertly done using original plans and descriptions of the fort. Here we very much enjoyed talking with the trio of re-enacters, a blacksmith, a candle-maker, and a soap maker. All had stories to tell, and all were completely fluent in their various crafts, as well as the lives of our ancestors in the 18th century. Time after time Concetta and I think we're pretty versed in history, and time after time the docents surprise us with new and valuable information.

Harrodsburg was well worth the stop and ate up the balance of our day. After that we asked the internet to show us a nearby camp suitable for RVs, and we soon landed here at Lake Herrington. Renting a space at the Chimney Rock RV Campground turned out to be a little on the pricey side, but the camp is one of the few that we would consider in A#1 condition. Everything is neat and orderly, the utilities are all present in blacktopped and graveled spaces, and the laundryroom was better than average.

So that's it for today. We simply had a great time today. We didn't get very far, but tomorrow is another day. Concetta wondered out loud today if I thought we'd actually get to the state of Maine before it was time to make for home. I don't know, I told her. We've twice before set out for Maine and didn't even get close. Only time will tell. If you want to know if we get there finally, you'll have to stay tuned. Until then, we wish you Happy Travels.

Wednesday, May 11, 2016

Day 33 -- Louisville to Elizabethtown, Kentucky -- 70 Miles

In case you hadn't noticed, it didn't rain today in this part of Kentucky. Not this morning. Not this afternoon. Not anywhere we happened to be. The sky occasionally looked mildly disagreeable, but moments later it would look happy again. So we walked all over the place -- Concetta says about 9,500 steps worth. We walked to several museums. We walked to a liquor emporium and a whiskey distillery. We walked two historic farmsteads, and a state park. And just for good measure, we walked a plain old neighborhood in Bardstown just to see the neat old Victorian houses. And during all that time not a drop of rain fell on us. I think perhaps we're simply dreaming because yesterday enough water to fill the Panama Canal fell on us with scarcely any letup.

Okay, so it's not yesterday. I get that. But how in the heck can a state in this union have such capricious weather? Yesterday, incessant rain, hail stones enough to bury small animals, and your odd tornado to nail your attention when you get bored with the rain and hail. But today! Today bestowed sunshine and more sunshine from horizon to horizon. It was just unfathomable!

Speaking of today, I'll get on with it. Our plan for the first part of the day was to seek out some high-quality, Willett Distillery Family Estate Bottled Single Barrel Straight Rye Whiskey for our young son back in Nevada who is building a nice collection of such treasures for his home bar. So, after gasing up the rig in Louisville, we headed south on Interstate 65 and then branched off on state route 245 toward Bardstown. Of course finding Rye Whiskey was not our sole reason for heading toward Bardstown, I had seen on the map that there was the "Oscar Getz Museum of Whiskey History" in Bardstown as well, which promised to make the trip doubly interesting.

Our trip through the Kentucky countryside this morning was nothing short of fabulous, especially after we got on state route 245 and away from most of the 18-wheelers. We just love the two-lane roads, even if they are more tedious to drive, because the foliage hugging the narrow roads is so green and lush, the roadside geology is so right there in your face, and the small towns and farms that pop up beside the road are just so picturesque and idyllic looking.

Following the GPS instructions to the letter, we arrived at Bardstown around mid morning and proceeded to accidentally stumble over the Whiskey Museum (photo top left) almost immediately. As an added benefit, the museum was located right next door to a very large church which came with a very large parking lot, only about 10% of which had any cars parked there. So, without even having to search, we scored a perfect level place to park right next to our initial destination.

The whiskey museum didn't score very high on my "Favorite Places" list as I thought there was just way too much to take in. I photographed what I could, but the only thing I really remember was a neat old photograph they had in the office of a bunch of "label-sticker" girls from 1912 (photo below right) whose job it was to put the labels on the whiskey bottles. According to the museum attendant, women were most often given the label-sticking task because they were more precise and careful about getting the sticky squares on straight.

Other then that, I liked the Carrie Nation exhibit that dealt with National Prohibition (photo left above) since it had a cool ax that Carrie had used to bust open whiskey barrels that got in her way. Concetta says one of her favorite exhibits involved George Washington's stills. Good ol' George had as many as five or six stills in operation and his fields produced a number of different grains to facilitate the whiskey-making process. In 1797 Washington was noted for having the largest distillery in American with a production figure that topped 11,000 gallons of rye whiskey.

Another favorite of Concetta's was the display on how the word "Booz" came into the American Lexicon. From the web: "In the mid 1800s, E. G. Booz was a liqour dealer in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. in the years 1858 through the 1860s and right on up to 1870. The Whitney glass works had a retail office in Philadelphia at 118 Walnut street and right next door to them Edmund G. Booz had his store front where he was selling his cabin-shaped Booz bottles to liquor merchants and tavern owners throughout the Delaware Valley." I guess Mr. Booz must have had some fine products to be remembered a century and a half later.

After the Whiskey Museum we paid a short visit to the History Museum next door, then we went in search of the Willett Distillery on the outskirts of town. Thanks to the GPS it was pretty easy to find, and though the distillery property was somewhat of a disappointment, as we were expecting something along the lines of what we'd encountered in 2014 at the Four Roses distillery a bit to the north and east of here, we did fulfill our mission and acquire Rob's limited edition rye whiskey. Once back in the RV we had some lunch right there in the parking lot with a long expanse of lawn out our dining room window. Four Roses seemed to put a much higher emphasis on landscaping their property, whereas Willett sort of decorated their large expanses of semi-kept lawn with barrel houses in the not so chic colors of dingy gray metal and rust. Still, the tour building is pretty (photo below left) and we're told the whiskey is top notch.

After lunch it was time to go looking for Abraham Lincoln again. We had become aware that the farmstead where Abraham Lincoln was born AND the farmstead some miles distant where Lincoln later grew up was to be seen just south along Rural Route 31e from Bardstown. Lincoln's birth town is called Hodgenville, and contains a rather decent museum, and, right next door, some nice folks at the Chamber of Commerce who went out of their way to direct us. Where they were directing us was the Lincoln Birthplace State Park just to the east of town that contains a huge marble shrine devoted to the Lincoln Family's log cabin (it's inside the marble edifice). The park is just beautiful and is built around a natural phenomena known as "Sinking Spring," a water source which was located on Thomas Lincoln's farmstead in the first decade of the 19th century. It was called "sinking" because it was at the bottom of a sink hole.

We learned that the Lincoln family would later lose the Sinking Spring property via a property dispute, and would have to move northeast to a place known as "Knob Creek," a piece of property that the Lincolns would also eventually lose in a property dispute. After losing two farms in Kentucky, the Lincolns then migrated across the Ohio River to Indiana, and eventually to Illinois.

What is interesting to me is that my mother's father's ancestors started out just north of the Lincolns, closer to Louisville, around the same time. They would also move across the Ohio to Illinois and would locate themselves very near the Lincolns. In the early part of the 1800s in Kentucky, property disputes, property fraud, and just a confusion of records sent many, many families across the Ohio, away from Kentucky, and into what had been Indian country for many generations before tribes were forced to move. It was a sad tale for native Americans, but the millions of acres of land gave generations of Americans a place to put down roots and grow the country.

We really stretched our day out as long as we could today, but by 4:30 p.m. the Sinking Spring State Park was asking us to please have our RV out of the park by 4:45 p.m. So, we asked the ranger to recommend a nearby RV camp, which he did, and we motored off toward Elizabethtown, some 15 miles away to the west. Although the day was long, we did manage to squeeze in our cocktail hour between the usual RV setup, two loads of laundry, some quiet reading time (for Concetta), and blog time (for me). Now, it's just about bedtime and I will have to wind this up.

So, when you hit the dusty trail and seek out your favorite places on the road of life, we wish you Happy Travels!

Tuesday, May 10, 2016

Day 32 -- Lake Moffitt to Louisville, Kentucky -- 161 Miles

To quote that now famous philosopher, Jack T. Colton, in Romancing the Stone, "One hell of a morning has turned into a bitch of a day!" It all started about 3:00 a.m. this morning when the muffled sounds of tiny raindrops on the RV roof suddenly increased in intensity until it compared favorably with what the great Niagara must sound like if you happened to camp at the foot of the falls.

The rain fell that way for a couple of hours, and then began to taper off a bit. By breakfast time it had largely quit and the sun had even begun to poke it's head through the clouds. I was even able to walk around the camp and snap a few photos before I had to pack up the RV gear and head out.

Moffitt Lake in Kentucky turned out to be just the finest, most reasonably-priced camp we've come across. The scenery is lovely, including a view of the lake from virtually every camp site. The staff is extra nice, especially the head maintenance guy who came by a couple of times to see if we needed anything. His name was Eddie, and he said he'd lived his whole life in Kentucky, was born and raised right down the road from the lake, he said. We even ran into Eddie as we were leaving the camp and we stopped and shook hands and wished each other well. He was just the sort of guy you don't come across every day. We were glad we met him.

The drive back to Route 60 from the Lake was wonderfully picturesque. The farm fields were green as an emerald, and were a perfect backdrop to the red barns and John Deere-green farm equipment. Even the roadside ditches got in on the act with their riot of bright yellow wildflowers.

And that, dear readers, is where the good part of the day ended. By the time we drove the dozen and a half miles back to Route 60 so we could head east toward Louisville, the sky had turned angry-looking. And then, drop by drop, wind gust by wind gust, last night's thunderous rain made its reappearance. Thereafter, the storm built in intensity until we were being pelted with sheets of rain, the skies on all sides of us were crackling with lightening, and thunder claps boomed incessantly to give the whole scene punctuation.

Stopping only for lunch, we forged ever eastward toward our afternoon goal of Louisville, though we had no set goal of just where we would be staying. In 2014 when we came to Louisville, we picked out a KOA camp just across the Ohio River in Indiana that we thought might be good. Little did we know that a very active rail line ran just to the east of the camp's boundary. All night long trains thundered by with irritating frequency. I told Concetta we definitely would not be staying there this time.

About mid afternoon the storm clouds really began to look ominous, though we could see clearer skies in the direction we were heading. We decided not to worry. But then, suddenly, my cell phone chimed with an incoming message. I gave the phone to Concetta and she read the alert from Verizon. "Tornado warning in your area," it read. "Get to shelter immediately." We looked at each other, then at the torrents of rain falling outside.

I'm not sure where the Verizon folks expect us to go," I said to Concetta. "Let's just keep an eye out all around us and proceed onward. We drove some more. At one point we even pulled off the highway, got out of the rig, and surveyed the surrounding skies, but saw no sign of a funnel-shaped cloud.

We had only been back on the highway a short time and a message from Verizon came again. "Tornado Warning in your area until 2:30 p.m.," it said. "Take shelter NOW."

Just about that time the rain really began to increase in intensity and everywhere the sky was alive with lightening flashes. We rolled into the little town of Garrett and the first thing I saw was a tiny abandoned gas station with a nice sturdy canopy still in place. I swung the wheel over, rolled off the highway and slid neatly underneath the old station's canopy on the diagonal so that as much as possible of the RV's roof would be protected from flying objects.

Moments later, just as hail began to tap-tap-tap onto the exposed surfaces of the RV, a black faded pickup rolled in and parked beside us. Then, as the hail began to drum loudly on the filling station's metal roof and on what surfaces of the RV could not be protected, more people rolled in off the street and wedged themselves anywhere they could find a small corner of the roof to protect them. By the time the hail had tapered off, the lot contained a half dozen vehicles in addition to our own. Hail was mounded all over the parking lot, and rain was coming down in waterfall-like torrents.

But after thirty minutes or so, the storm began to lighten a bit and most of the cars began to drift back onto the highway. Once everyone was gone we, too, rolled back out onto the highway and headed east. The rain never really stopped, but it became more manageable and we were able to make at least 45 to 55 mph toward our destination.

So what was our destination? Well, by then Concetta had found a camp near Louisville that was NOT the KOA from two years ago. We programmed the GPS and finally found our waterlogged home for the night just in time to have the rain largely stop. I'm always much elated when the rain stops at least long enough for me to get set up.

But the lack of rain turned out to be about the only positive thing that happened for about the next hour. Everything else immediately began to go wrong. First, as we pulled into the park we noticed that it looked NOTHING like the advertised description. The camp was run down, tired-looking, and was filled with battered old mobile homes. Second, there was no designated office structure. That's almost always a bad sign. Not seeing an office, I went ahead and rolled through the the park until I found an empty spot, then I backed the rig in close to the power pole, and shut off the engine.

Out the truck's front window I could just see a couple of women sitting on a nearby mobile's front porch smoking cigarettes. Deciding that I ought to not wear my new tennis shoes through the surrounding mud and water, I took the time to put on my Kroks. Then I went over to learn from the smoking women just where a person went to pay.

"Over yonder at space twenty-seven is the manager," the younger of the two women said, and extended her arm so I would get the general direction I need to go. It was raining just ever so softly, and I was thankful I had thought to don my rain jacket.When I got to space 27, the manager, a young man of about twenty, was just exiting the mobile. "Hello," he said, when he saw me.

"I just put my rig in space 8," I said. "You the manager?"

"I am," the young man said. "Come on inside." Then he added, "By the way, you have a reservation?"

I shook my head. "Sorry," I said.

"It's okay," he said. "This past weekend we were full up and there wouldn't have been even one space, but now, you can just stay in space 8. No problem."

When we go inside I immediately began to suspect that there wasn't going to be any sort of standard operating procedure such as we experience at every other camp. I wouldn't under any circumstances be giving the young lad a credit card. "So how much for one night?" I asked.

He looked thoughtful, like he was trying to decide just how much he was going to be able to charge me without my deciding to go down the road. "Well," he said, "since you didn't have a reservation the cost is $35.00. You can pay with a check or with cash." He sort of trailed off at that point and studied me as if he was wondering if he'd get away with charging me that much.

Suspecting that he probably wouldn't be giving the owner any money I gave him, I nevertheless handed him the $35.00 and felt relived that I didn't have to drive any further. "Thanks," I said. "Oh, and by the way, "does the power pole have 30amp?"

He shook his head. "We only have 50amp here. You'll have to use an adapter if you have one."

Thankfully, I did have one. I just bought it on this trip when I found a great deal at the park just south of the Grand Canyon. Best $15.00 I ever spent while RVing, because without the adapter I would have had to find one or hook up using just the 110AC cord.

It was when I was leaving the manager's mobile that things really began to go wrong. The Kroks I was wearing have become quite worn and slick over time and I only use them for walking around in the wet grass and mud on this trip. But as I started to descend the slippery porch I fell and neatly removed a 1/2" wide swath of skin on my right forearm about 8 or 10 inches long. Naturally the blood began to flow with a vengeance and I had to roll up my jacket sleeve to keep from getting it all bloody.

After I got back to the RV of course I still had to get the water, sewer, and electrical set up and everything shipshape. All through this process I had to keep stopping and swabbing up the blood on my forearm with paper towels. But once that was done, I began to breath a sigh of relief. I shouldn't have.

The problem was that while doing the nightly sewer dump after hooking up, I left the water hose in the ON position that was flushing the tank. I had only just gotten back in the RV, and had started to tend to my damaged arm, when Concetta let out a shriek from the bathroom that the toilet was overflowing. Of course I knew immediately the dumb mistake I had made. Jamming my feet in my soggy, slippery Kroks, I dashed for the door. I cleared the steps okay, but as I neared the rear of the coach where it was extremely muddy from all the rain, I slipped and fell again, banging my head into the overhanging slideout.

Picking myself out of the mud, I hobbled over and turned off the water hose, then pulled open the black tank valve which sent an explosion of water toward the drain. I knew that there was probably going to be hell to pay when next I appeared in the doorway. My Kroks were destroyed. My Bermuda shorts were covered with mud. My arm was bleeding profusely on everything. My left side felt like a heavyweight boxer had pummeled it, more damages from falling down the stairs. And that was only MY problems. I could only imagine what the bathroom looked like.

At this point Concetta ordered me to find old towels (I had brought several), rubber gloves, and a bucket. I got right on it, blood or no blood. Fortunately, the bathroom floor was soon cleaned and disinfected, the old towels and bathroom rug were segregated in an orange Home Depot bucket I'd brought for just such emergencies, and my bloody arm was wrapped up in a large fold of paper towels so I could bleed out in peace.

So you see, that even if life seems to go your way for long stretches of time, there's always that one day when you should have stayed in bed. Oh, and did I mention that the campsite we chose quite by accident since it seemed level, is situated about fifty feet from a rail line! I had no idea until the first train rolled through. The tracks had been screened by trees and shrubs. Fortunately, it doesn't seem to be quite as active as the one two years ago at the KOA, but hey, the night is young.

So, while I can still move my fingers without pain medication, I wish you Happy Travels!

Monday, May 9, 2016

Day 31 -- Paducah to Moffitt Lake, Kentucky -- 75 Miles

Paducah, Kentucky, is another one of those noteworthy spots on the map of which few people know, well, unless they happened to have been born there. When I first came across the town's name, I thought I remembered an old W. C. Fields quip about Paducah. In my head it played back as, "I spent a week in Paducah one night," done in a suitable W. C Fields drawl, but I couldn't find any connection on the web to Fields and Paducah.

Last night we followed the advice of the Good Sam book and picked a camp identified as "Duck Creek RV Park." Since we had two to choose from in Paducah, we picked it simply by coin toss, not reputation. When we parked in the entrance area, and I made my way to the office, I could immediately see that getting a space was going to be iffy at best since nearly every space appeared to already contain a RV.

So when the desk clerk asked if I had a reservation, I figured that we might be in a tiny bit of trouble. After I told her no, we didn't, but asked if she had anything left, she said, "Well, if you'd come by here yesterday I'd have to tell you no." Today, I got a few spaces left."

"Thanks," I said, I'm sure sounding relieved. Then, just because she was petite and cute, I added, "I heard that you folks in Kentucky were just the best people in the world."

Her smile got all toothy, and she said, "Beats me, I'm from Georgia." She handed me the map and camp rules paperwork and then said, "Now y'all wait until I come along with the golf cart and I'll show you where to park."

All seemed well until we followed the Georgia blond in the golf cart as she circled all the way around the RV camp lodge and then led us back to the very front row of the camp, just facing the highway. Of course our hearts immediately sank because we just knew that the highway noise was going to be considerable, and probably keep us awake that night. Then Miss Georgia smiled and waved and off she went. Guess my flirting needs a little work.

No matter, I told Concetta. It's only one night. Then I got us all hooked up, and I even lowered the awning which happened to be on the sunny side of the coach. Then we had our cocktails on our own personal picnic table, under the awning, even though the traffic noise sometimes pushed the limits of our patience.

So, bottom line, unless you can get a space at the very back of the property when you come to Paducah, better bypass Duck Creek.

From the web: "Paducah was formally established as a town in 1830 and incorporated as a city by the state legislature in 1838. By this time, steam boats traversing the river system and its port facilities were important to trade and transportation. In addition, railroads began to be developed in the region. A factory for making red bricks, and a foundry for making rail and locomotive components became the nucleus of a thriving "River and Rail" economy."

"It became the site of dry dock facilities for steamboats and towboats, and thus headquarters for many barge companies. Because of its proximity to coalfields further to the east in Kentucky and north in Illinois, Paducah also became an important railway hub for the Illinois Central Railroad. This was the primary north-south railway connecting the industrial cities of Chicago and East St. Louis to the Gulf of Mexico at Gulfport, Mississippi and New Orleans, Louisiana. The Illinois Central system also provided east-west links to the Burlington Northern and the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Railways (which later merged to become the BNSF Railway)."

"The Illinois Central Railroad began construction of their largest locomotive workshop at Paducah in 1924. Over a period of 190 days, a large ravine between Washington and Jones Streets was filled with 44,560 carloads of dirt to enlarge the site to include 23 buildings. The eleven million dollar project was completed in 1927 as the fourth largest industrial plant in Kentucky. It became the largest employer in Paducah with 1,075 employees in 1938."

"The Paducah shops were converted to maintain diesel locomotives as steam locomotives were replaced through the 1940s and 1950s; and a nationally-known rebuilding program for aging diesel locomotives from Illinois Central and other railroads began in 1967. The shops became part of the Paducah and Louisville Railway in 1986; and are operated by VMV Paducahbilt."

Looking at Trip Advisor, we discovered that Paducah has a large number of things to do. There's a Quilt Museum, A rail museum, a Civil War Museum, a river walk, a huge and wonderful collection of sea wall murals (see photos 1,2 & 4 above), a Santa Fe train, and just oodles of lesser attractions, including the wonderful bakery where we scored a box of the best-looking cookies we've seen in a good while.

My reason for wanting to go to Paducah's old town, near the banks of the Ohio River, was the promise of a "River Discovery Museum," something that we had missed just a couple of days ago in Cape Girardeau. I've been trying to beef up my knowledge of American river commerce since I learned that my mother's father's great grandfather had been a timber raft man. Timber rafters would ascend American rivers to the forested headwaters, cut a large amount of timber, lash it all together into one giant raft, then descend to some designated spot where there was a sawmill waiting to buy the timber.

It's been said that my ancestor, born in Louisville, Kentucky in 1811, was plying his timbering trade on the Ohio in the 1830s when he met his future wife in Zanesville, Ohio. I suspect that he was not timber rafting the Ohio as is told in family lore, but perhaps the Licking or the Muskingum Rivers that run through Zanesville. At any rate, good ol' Preston Jones gave up his wild, river-running ways and settled down once he had married Julia Ann and taken up farming. I'm not sure just how tough an adjustment that would have been, but a farmer he would remain until his death in 1858 out on the Illinois prairie near the town of Carrollton near where we spent the night several days ago.

Naturally, what I'm looking for is information on people who worked as timber rafters. But try as I might, I have found no book on the subject. Even the web has almost nothing. So it was with a great deal of anticipation that we visited the River Discovery Museum today. But alas, their book selection was meager at best, and the resident docent had never even heard of timber rafting. I scored a small pamplet-sized book on steamboats for future reference, but that was about it.

Well, except for my getting to steer a full-sized towboat tug down the Ohio toward its confluence with the Tennessee (photo above). I had to pass another tow, ease my way close to a slower boat, and steer my own barges between the stanchions of a truss bridge. I did it all without hitting anything or overshooting my marks. It took just a feather-light touch on the wheel. What I'm talking about, of course, is the river pilot's simulator that the River Discovery Museum has at its disposal. Hard to believe it's been over forty years since I held a real ship's wheel in my hand. And damn, it sure felt good.

After lunch in Paducah, we hit the road. As I said, there are lots and lots of things to do there, but we wanted to get a least a few miles behind us in the direction of Louisville. We could have gotten to Louisville this afternoon, I expect, if we had been willing to drive the interstate, but we took instead the tiny, winding, super-narrow Route 60 from Paducah for it's tendency to follow, at not too great a distance, the various undulations of the Ohio River itself. So it was that we ended up at the positively gorgeous little camp known as Moffitt Lake, near Morganfield. We only ticked off 75 miles or so, but the trip was slow, comfortable, and downright delightful.

Moffitt Lake was a camp that Concetta found on her IPhone, and had we been Hansel and Grettel, we would have needed bread crumbs dropped to find our way back out of the hills and woods without a GPS tomorrow. Twists and turns, up hills and down, we were totally lost by the time the magic brain delivered us here. But what a wonderful surprise the lake turned out to be. Though there were about six camp vehicles of various sorts here when we arrived, we only detected humans associated with perhaps two of them. As in many camps, as I've recently pointed out, the campsites we saw on our afternoon walk were all long-termers, and looked as though they had been in their respective camps for months. We are, in fact, the only transient campers here tonight.

The lake and surrounding rolling hills are just breathtakingly beautiful. Huge ancient trees adorn the campsites, and most sites have blacktop pads and grassy surrounds. No sewer connections are available, but water and electrical come with each pad. We paid $20.00, which is wonderfully cheap, and all campsites have a view of the lake. And they do have a dump station which appears to be easy enough to approach.

Tomorrow we're going to stick to Kentucky Route 60 on our way to Louisville. We're not sure what we might encounter along the way, but that's the fun of serendipity. I'd sure like it if we got to see the Ohio at some point, since there were too many trees in the way this afternoon as we motored northeast from Paducah. But come what may, rain or shine, I'm sure it will be exciting. So until we meet again, we wish you Happy Travels.

Sunday, May 8, 2016

Day 30 -- Cape Girardeau, Missouri to Paducah, Kentucky -- 125 Miles

Today we did a tremendous amount of not too much. Cape Girardeau, Missouri, on a Sunday is pretty much like everywhere you visit in the south, it's just quiet on church day. Still, I had two things I wanted to do before we rolled on toward Kentucky: I wanted to visit the Cape River Heritage Museum on Independence Street; and I wanted to visit the Esicar's Meat Market, now called the Butcher Block, where my dad had ordered his bacon sixty some odd years ago, and had it sent out to our house in Southern California.

Well, true to Sunday form, neither place was open for business. Still, we were able to grab a few photos and walk a bit before heading back to Route 55, the highway that we planned to take south out of town. Actually, I was hoping to accidentally stumble over the bridge to East Cape Girardeau, which appears to be across the Mississippi River from West Cape Girardeau. This would have allowed us to take the shortest possible route toward Cairo, Illinois, our lunchtime destination. As it was, we missed that opportunity and ended up traveling all the way south to the intersection of Missouri Route 60 and Interstate Route 55 before we could turn northeast toward Cairo. That added about fifty extra miles to our total for the day, but then we're doing this for the scenery, not the fewest miles traveled.

Our lunchtime destination of Cairo, Illinois, is a town that I've wanted to see ever since I listened to Rex Ingram as runaway slave, Jim, tell Mickey Rooney's Huckleberry Finn, that he just had to get to Cairo, Illinois and be free. And Huck tells the reader, as he and Jim sit atop that old raft just floating down the mighty Mississippi, that, "We judged that three nights more would fetch us to Cairo, at the bottom of Illinois, where the Ohio River comes in, and that was what we was after. We would sell the raft and get on a steamboat and go way up the Ohio amongst the free States, and then be out of trouble."

And who, I wonder, hasn't read that classic bit of Samuel Clemens and failed to feel every emotion of those two fantastic characters. And who hasn't wondered just what Cairo, Illinois looked like. Well, today we got to find out. Sadly, Cairo's heyday came in the mid 1920s when it sported a population of 15,000 people, and could boast of a railroad link to the north, river traffic as much as you wanted, and a business economy second to few cities of its size. But somewhere along the line, some say because of unbridled racial tensions, the bloom has faded on Cairo's rose, and now the town looks more like a recent murder victim, lying in the street, who's just waiting for the local mortician to arrive so the funeral arrangements can be made. But hey, as any successful journalist will be happy to tell you, it's all copy.

Once we arrived in Cairo, the first thing we did was locate that once strategic piece of geography that rests like a arrowhead-shaped bookmark between the southwestern-trending Ohio, and the southward-rushing Mississippi (photo left). Above the Ohio and east of the Mississippi is Illinois. Below the Ohio and east of the Mississippi is Kentucky. And on the far side of the Mississippi is Missouri. The tiny spit of land where the two giant rivers collide is no bigger than a couple of wedge-shaped football fields, but it has been the location of some momentus events.

From the web I learned that "Cairo's history goes back to 1660, when Father Louis Hennepin, a French missionary priest, visited there and explored the land. He didn’t settle, but he did leave a record of his stay."

"In 1702, the Sun King Louis XIV sponsored a group of French explorers led by Charles Juchereau de St. Denis who did settle. They made a very successful living killing various types of animals and sending thousands of skins back to France. Their success was short-lived, however. Local Cherokee and other tribes, who relied on those animals for survival, attacked the settlement, confiscated the skins and killed most of the men."

"After that, the land sat empty for a hundred years, until Lewis and Clark arrived in 1803. In their party was a man from Baltimore named John G. Comegys, who saw such great promise in this land at the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers that he purchased 1,800 acres there and got authorization from the territorial legislature to incorporate a town. Ol' Johnny Boy, as he was called, had a thing for Egypt--a lot of people did at that time. Napoleon’s Egyptian campaign had inspired a big Egyptomania movement. Comegys saw a resemblance between the Mississippi River Valley and Nile Delta, so he named his piece of land Cairo, which he pronounced Cay-ro. He fully expected his Cay-ro to become the Ki-ro of the Midwest."

"It didn’t happen. When Comegys died in 1820, he still owed a lot of money for his Cairo land. His family defaulted on the payments, and the federal government took over, sold the lots, and put the money in the Bank of Cairo. In the meantime, poor Cairo was still waiting for a permanent settlement to take hold. It finally did in 1837 with the advent of the steamboat trade. Unfortunately, though often more than 10 boats a day landed at Cairo it wasn't enough to ensure the success of the tiny city."

"In 1846, 10,000 acres of the area were purchased by the trustees of the Cairo City Property Trust, a group of investors who were interested in making the town the terminus of the projected Illinois Central Railroad which arrived in 1855. A city charter was obtained in 1857, and Cairo flourished as trade with Chicago spurred development. By 1860, the population exceeded 2,000."

"Cairo was headquarters for General Ulysses S. Grant and Admiral Andrew Hull Foote during the western campaigns of the American Civil War. Grant's presence forced much of the city's trade to be diverted to Chicago. Cairo failed to regain much of the trade lost during the war, and agriculture and lumber and sawmills subsequently came to dominate the economy. During the American Civil War, Cairo was a strategically important supply base and training center for the Union army."

"After the Civil War, the city became a hub for railroad shipping in the region, which added to its economy. By 1900 several railroad lines branched from Cairo. In addition to shipping and railroads, a major industry in Cairo was the operation of ferries. Into the late 19th century, nearly 250,000 railroad cars could be ferried across the river in as little as six months. Vehicles were also ferried, as there were no automobile bridges in the area in the early 20th century. The ferry industry created numerous jobs in Cairo to handle large amounts of cargo and numerous passengers through the city."

"Wealthy merchants and shippers built numerous fine mansions in the 19th and early 20th century, including the Italianate Magnolia Manor (photo right), completed in 1872, and many more. But Cairo has always been located in a very vulnerable place in times of flooding. Floods in 1927 and 1937 heavily damaged the town. Following the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927, the levee system around Cairo was strengthened. As part of this project, the Corps of Engineers established the Birds Point-New Madrid Floodway."

"The Ohio River flood of 1937 brought a record water level to Cairo that crested at 59.5 feet. To protect Cairo, Corps of Engineers closed the flood gate and blew a breach in the Bird's Point levee for the first time to relieve pressure on the Cairo flood wall. Following the flood, the concrete flood wall was raised to its current height. It is designed to protect the town from flood waters up to 64 feet."

"With the decline in river trade, as has been the case in many other cities on the Mississippi, Cairo has experienced a marked decline in its economy and population. Its highest population was 15,203 in 1920; in 2010 it had 2,831 residents (it's even less now). The community and region are working to stop abandonment of the city, restore its architectural landmarks, and develop heritage tourism focusing on its history and relationship to the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers, to bring new opportunities to the community."

Before leaving Cairo I couldn't resist taking a few photos to document the sad, sad look of the place, though we did see some very nice houses on the west side of town. But as far as we could see the patient better get some sort of transfusion pretty soon. There is already evidence of buildings being torn down for the building materials that they generate. Concetta wanted to know why they would bother. But I told her when a single "used brick" goes for about a dollar, you can make out pretty well harvesting them. It looked to me as though Cairo might become a vacant lot someday soon.

After leaving Cairo, we crossed the Ohio River on Route 60 and headed northeast toward Paducah, Kentucky, on what turned out to be a very rural, and splendidly scenic road. We didn't have any specific reason for picking Paducah, but it boasted a couple of nice campgrounds and we figured we would reach one of them about the right time of day -- cocktail hour. So we got into camp fairly early, got set up, and had our cocktails under the awning, and now we're thinking about thinking about dinner. Tomorrow, we've got a museum just down the road, they tell us. Supposedly, it's a "River" museum much like the one we didn't get to see in Cape Girardeau, Missouri, this morning.

So, our intention tomorrow is to follow Kentucky Route 60 as it flirts with the state's northern border on the Ohio River. Eventually, I want to do some genealogical work in Kentucky, if possible, as my Mother's Father's ancestors came from Louisville around the time of the end of the Revolution. So, stay tuned as we enjoy Kentucky, seek out a few distilleries, and generally enjoy the achingly beautiful countryside. We wish you Happy Traveling!