Off to See America: Last Stop, Kentucky!

We arrived at our friends’ house in Louisville pretty late, but for some reason, we were pretty wound up. They have two nice dogs, and Turner and Hazel were pretty excited to play with them when we got there. I was tired so I went to bed, and eventually Mom and Dad decided it was time for all of them to hit the hay also.

The next morning, we donned our swimsuits and headed to a splash pad. It felt great to be outside after being cooped up in the car the past few days.

Next to the splash pad was a huge pedestrian bridge that crossed the equally huge Ohio River. I really wanted to walk across it, but we needed to get the smaller kids down for a nap, so Dad promised me we could do it later.

After lunch, Dad and I headed to a walking bridge over the Ohio River for more outside time. On the way over, Dad told me it looked like it was going to rain and we might get wet while walking, and I told him I was okay with that. It thundered the whole time we walked, but it didn’t rain.

I read the sign at the bottom of the bridge, which talked about its history – it used to be a train bridge. I figured out how old it was based on the year it was built. We started walking and when we were halfway across, looked down into the big old Ohio River. We walked all the way to the Indiana side of the bridge but Indiana hadn’t finished their side of the bridge, so we had to stop just short of the end. We could see the end but couldn’t walk to it. I kept asking Dad why Indiana was closed. We turned around and walked back. Dad thinks it was about 3 miles. It’s a good things taking walks is one of my favorite things to do!

We got back in the car, headed for the grocery store. Like Dad predicted, it started to rain. Then it rained harder. And harder. We pulled into a parking spot at the grocery. While Dad thought about whether we should brave the rain to go into the store, it started hailing. Dad decided we were not going anywhere, so I climbed into the front seat and we ate snacks Mom packed for our trip while we waited out the storm. After about half an hour, the storm passed. We went inside, did our shopping and headed back to the house.

Meanwhile, Mom and Tabi were at the house braving another type of storm – the wrath of three little kids who refused to nap. By the time we got back to the house, the kids had won the fight. So we were all in for an evening of grumpy kids and moms.

We tried driving around for a change of pace, then once Mike came home from work, met up with him, Tabi and Bowman for dinner. But Kentucky’s laws are different and it turned out the restaurant was too full of cigarette and cigar smoke, and Turner and Hazel were screaming non-stop, so we headed home for mac n cheese and bed.

The next day, we started out with playtime at the park. Right in front of their house, Mike and Tabi have a park with swings and a fountain where kids can play, and we headed down there for a bit. Because of lack of sleep the day before, Turner was wiped out. So he headed off for an early nap. Hazel and Bowman also took great naps and everyone was in a happy mood for an afternoon trip to the Louisville Science Museum.

We had a great time at the museum. Our first stop was the water table, our usual fave. After a while there, Bowman was soaked and the rest of us started fighting, so Mom and Dad put an end to that. Next we checked out the rest of the museum. The highlight was really the kids’ section, where they had a huge pretend airplane that we really liked.

When we got back to the house, Hazel and Turner took a bath in Tabi’s Jacuzzi tub. They really loved the bubbles. Then we had a relaxing evening. We walked to a nearby pizza restaurant and ice cream shop. We had so much fun we had a pretty hard time settling down for bedtime, but we knew we had to rest for the long drive home ahead of us.