Caves, Corvettes & Tanks

When the boys said they wanted to do the 4 hour tour through the cave, I thought they were crazy. Who wants to spend 4 hours underground in a cold, damp cave? Turns out that they picked the right tour. The 4 hours went by very quickly and with it being so hot this summer the cool cave air was refreshing.
Mammoth Cave is indeed mammoth, both in miles of caves and in the size of the 'rooms'. The room we ate lunch in was large enough to hold 40 picnic tables without being cramped. Yep, we ate lunch in a cave and the veggie soup was really good.
The cave is remarkably dry, we encountered only one section where water had made its way through the rock. That section has a fabulous draping of rock appropriately named Niagara Falls. On of our tour guides was a descendant of one of the original tour guides. It was fascinating to hear his stories of the cave before it was a national park when people lived and farmed the land above the cave.
That night CJ and I swam in the wonderfully warm outdoor pool. We watched a storm blow in and the sky turn a beautiful deep, dark and ominous blue.
The next morning it was off to the Corvette factory. No pictures were allowed but it's pretty easy to imagine the boys watching one of their favorite cars being put together. You could almost see them adding up their pennies and wondering if they could drive one home!

After the factory tour we headed north to Ft. Knox and the General Patton Museum. There we saw some tanks, and then some more tanks. The museum told of Patton's childhood and career in the army. We all learned that Patton survived both WWI and WWII  but never made it home due to a car accident. He is buried in Luxembourg, I wonder why.
Next we headed to Lexington for an overnight before heading home. On the way we finally spotted horses, lots of beautiful horses on gorgeous rolling hillsides. What a wonderful place to live, for both people and horses. Lexington is a quaint city with several colleges. The architecture was very southern and very stately. Our stay in Lexington was short and deserves a trip back.
Kentucky is a state that is well worth the trip and offers something for everyone.