Last year, we visited Mammoth Cave National Park two different times. As you might imagine, our main goal there was to see some of the caves, and we went on two different cave tours. But we also took a little time to see some of the other sights of the area above ground.
As we were driving through the park area, Laura and I came across the Mammoth Cave Baptist Church. I always enjoy seeing old church buildings, and this one was quite interesting, tucked away between the trees and the woods. Very different from something like the Metropolitan Cathedral in Panama, this one was just a simple wooden building, relatively small and unassuming. Of course, the church is not the building, but rather the church is the people. So you should definitely not judge a church by is building, but rather by its love for God. But it is still interesting to see all the different types of church buildings that have been built over the years.
When you think of Mammoth Cave National Park, you probably think about walking through a dark cave deep in the earth, and it is true that the cave tours are the main attractions at Mammoth Cave. However, there are above-ground hiking trails to be discovered there, too. On our first visit, we decided to go for a hike before our Historic Cave Tour.
After checking out our options, we decided on the Mammoth Cave Railroad Bike and Hike Trail, partly because it starts out very near the Visitor Center, which was where we parked for our cave tour. However, we knew that we would not hike the entire trail, as it is over 9 miles long, and then we would have to hike the same 9 miles back to the Visitor Center. But we thought that we could walk for a while, keeping a watch on the time, and then turn around and go back. There was even a cemetery on the map that we thought we might see. So we each grabbed a bottle of water, as it was already getting hot out, and we set out on the trail.
Continuing with our Mammoth Cave National Park tour where the previous post left off…
About halfway through the tour, we came to a large area with benches. There, we sat to rest for a few moments while the ranger guide told about some of the history of the cave. This was also the portion of the tour where all of the lights were turned off to demonstrate total darkness. I did not bother taking a photo of that, however. And the glow-in-the-dark shirt of the guy in front of me kind of ruined the darkness a little. After that, we moved on to the dripstones portion of the tour, and these photos will move on to that as well.
As you may recall, we visited Mammoth Cave National Park as part of the Summer of Fun 2024. We enjoyed it so much that we went back for a second visit.
Because Mammoth Cave is so large, deserving its “mammoth” name, there are several different tours available. So for our second visit, we decided to take a different tour from the Historic Tour of our first visit. The Domes and Dripstones tour sounded interesting, partly because we did not see many dripstones in the first tour, and those are common in many caves around the world. Plus, the length and difficulty level were about the same as the Historic Tour, so we knew that we could do it. We made sure to have a reservation before we went, just to be sure that we got to go on the tour that we wanted.
During our stop at the Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historical Park near Hodgenville, Kentucky, we took some time to go inside the Visitor Center. It had a few interesting items on display and a small gift shop. And air conditioning, which was much appreciated on the day of our visit.
Yes, although this post is titled Inside the Abraham Lincoln Birthplace Visitor Center, this photo was actually taken outside, because that is where the sign was located. We did not spend too much time looking at the exhibits because we had arrived late in the day and wanted to have enough time to see everything, but we did look around for a few minutes.
On a trip through Kentucky, we visited Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historical Park south of Hodgenville to see where our 16th president was born.
The Abraham Lincoln Birthplace features a log cabin inside a marble Memorial Building on the site of the farm where Lincoln was born. The structure is on top of a hill, which makes it look even more imposing. While perhaps not quite as large as the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC, this site was actually built first, leading to its alternate name of The First Lincoln Memorial.
As we were traveling through Kentucky with the Riedels, we spent an afternoon at the National Corvette Museum in Bowling Green. Why is the Corvette Museum in Kentucky, you might ask? Because it is right across the street from the plant where all the Corvettes are made.
As you might guess, the National Corvette Museum is full of Corvettes, and a few other cars, too. Yes, I did take photos of just about every car in the museum. No, I probably will not share every single one of them. But in this first post, here are a couple of highlights.
We visited Mammoth Cave National Park in Kentucky and went on a cave tour. We were traveling through Kentucky on our way home from Indiana with the Riedels, and stopping at a National Park seemed like a great idea to everyone. Here are a few scenes from our tour.
Did you really visit a National Park if you did not take a park sign photo to prove that you were there? Yes you did, but I took a photo anyway.1
