Category Archives: Kentucky Fried Bucket List

The best picture I could get

My final night in Kentucky and the plans were to do it big. I wanted to start the night off at the newly opened Falls City Taproom. Falls City is one of my favorite local beers and it had been months since I had one. The plan was to get a group of people together and enjoy the evening before we went to see our friends in the band Houndmouth perform a hometown show at Headliners.

I was with my former roommate and his girlfriend at first due to some last minute backouts. Hellbent on checking this place come hell or highwater, we mapquested it(does anyone even use mapquest anymore or is that just a term forever etched in our brains?) and went off the beaten path. I was sure that this place was on Bardstown Road but I was mistaken. It was actually in a little building in what didn’t look like the most densely populated of areas. This was no concern to me.

We headed in and order some sample drinks. There was barely anyone in the place so it didn’t seem weird that the bartender didn’t ask us for cash. But after a few rounds of sample beers and more friends showing up we still we not getting charged. Finally, my friend from California bit the bullet and went and asked the price of the beers. Turns out, the Taproom didn’t have some sort of license or something so they technically weren’t allowed to sell beers. That’s right, this place is so awesome, drinks are FREE.

After feeling we had extended our welcome and Marty’s girlfriend weirding us out by the lack of customers, we headed to Bardstown Rd. before heading to the concert.

Wow. First and foremost I cannot believe that it has been a year since I have made a post in the Kentucky Fried Bucket List category. That truly is depressing. I really need to get back to Kentucky more. Secondly, I hate to make a blog entry about my best friend’s wedding but I cannot help that he chose to have his wedding at one of the must see places in Kentucky.

I flew up late in the evening on Thursday night and opted to stay in Louisville. Come Friday morning I needed to be in Lexington as I was part of the wedding and there was rehearsal shit that needed to go down. This was a first time for me being a wedding so I honestly didn’t know what to expect.

Being a part of the wedding meant we needed to be at Spindletop the day before the actual ceremony. This was a fantastic opportunity to roam the grounds of the Southern styled country club. I was one of the first wedding party members there so it gave me a chance to take lot of pictures undisturbed.

To say the establishment is huge is an understatement. The foyer is more than what every pubescent girl who watches Gone with the Wind for the first time could ever dream for as a home. The winding staircase will lead you down to the lavatories and the lounge. More on the lounge later. The lavatories are so amazing that even the guys restroom has a couch in it. Yeah, that happened.

Anyways, we did our rehearsal practice ceremony in the backyard on a perfect bluegrass summer day. And then it was time for the post-rehearsal dinner party. Not really sure what else to call it. The party was held across the street at the Kentucky Horse Park. The Horse Park was home of the 2010 Equestrian Games for those of you out of staters who are unfamiliar. You should probably Google it if you don’t know. The dinner was held in one of the Games’ pressbox rooms. So we had dinner, played musical chairs and even got awesome gifts for just being in the wedding party.

If you ever need to hide something

Saturday comes and it is gameday. My best friend is signing away his freedom forever and I am more than ecstatic to be there for him. I have my mom drop me off at the wedding since this is a night I had full intentions of not driving home on. When the car pulls up, I see the three other groomsman coming out of the front door in a hurry. Unsure what is going on, I quickly follow.

Apparently one of the groomsman had tried to straight up walk in the front door with a 12 pack of beer. Yeah, thats how we roll in Kentucky I guess. From what I could gather the front desk clerk was less than pleased by these actions. So we find another entrance and head down to the lounge and wait for the photo shoot. For some reason it was a big deal that groomsman had a bottle of bourbon in the country club but the bridesmaids were allowed to drink as much wine as they wanted without a look of contempt.

After the photoshoot we head to the library where the reception will take place and do some solid reading.

Then, just like Alanis always told my friend, you should expect rain on your wedding day. And not just a light rain. We’re talking a hurricane. So the ceremony had to be moved into one of the open rooms in the building at the last minute.

After the ceremony I snapped a picture of the official signing in the wedding party room. The festivities proceeded to go until 5 in the morning. It was a night that will never be forgotten. After recovering it was time to head back to the airport and get back to the Sunshine state.

Sign in the airport. This is my college. No big deal.

Finally back in the Bluegrass State! And you know what that means…Another Kentucky Fried Bucket List entry. When I was in 7th grade my class went on a field trip to the Slugger Museum but in all my years of actually living in Louisville I never made the efforts to visit.

Since I was visiting Kentucky for yet another wedding along with the fact that I had brought a date with me, I decided the museum would be the perfect event to kill time on Saturday before the wedding. After all, my date did play softball in college so I figured this would be right up her alley.

Tours take place every 30 minutes and of course we bought our tickets at 12:31PM. What this ended up meaning for us was that we would get to mingle in the foyer area for 29 minutes looking at baseball paraphernalia. The first thing I found was a selection of Hall of Famers previously used bats. The most prestigious of the collection was a bat of Mickey Mantle(seen in bunting action above).

After playing with the bats we read a bunch of stats and looked at some pictures, clay mannequins and some display of women’s pro baseball. It started to get boring and I became anxious as time slowly creeped on.

Finally, it was 1 and our tour was ready to begin. We entered the double doors and flashbacks of freshman year shop class came flooding through my neurons. I guess I forgot that the Louisville Slugger factory was essentially a wood working shop. As with all museums, pictures weren’t allowed but if you ever took shop class you wouldn’t need them. There wasn’t really much to please the eye. The tour was only like 15 minutes long and rather disappointing. It was interesting to see that the whole factory was ran with only a few employees though.

And as with each commencement of a tour at the Louisville Slugger Museum, visitors are awarded a miniature bat. A mini-bat that we would not be able to carry on the plane by the way. Lame. Overall, I would say that if you have ever been to the museum or are over the age of 12, you probably shouldn’t waste your time. But for the true baseball enthusiasts, you will probably get a kick out of the random tidbits you will learn.

Visiting Kentucky for the weekend, I knew that it was a requirement to set out and find an adventure. With hours to spare and a cheery companion at my side, we decided to take a stroll through the park. Now I’ve been to Cherokee Park several times for different occasions, mainly to just shoot my bow at the archery range, but I have never taken the time to leisurely explore the park. The wooded road entrance is just a precursor for some of the enjoyable experiences to be had in this park.

We parked the car the first opportunity we found and immediately found a dragon looking statue that I knew would be perfect for a picture opportunity (plus I am a sucker for people pictures). Then we chose a random direction and started our excursion.

It didn’t take long to find a trail off the beaten path and fortunately for me my partner in crime was subconsciously drawn to it before I could even make the suggestion to check it out. Just a few steps in and we found ourselves surrounded with some Kentucky summertime wilderness.

Cherokee Park is the perfect place to forget about the troubles of everyday life and take a moment to yourself to unwind. We stumbled upon a fallen tree hollowed throughout. I’m quite confident it could possibly be a portal to another dimension or an undiscovered labyrinth but I feared the vermin that might call the entrance home to fully emerge myself.

Afterwards, we continued down the path and the squirrels began to scurry and the birds chirped. Just as I started to pay close attention to mother nature my white pair of tennis shoes landed right in a big puddle of mud.

Although uncommon, you will cross the path of others on such a beautiful day but it is no problem to smile, say hello and continue on your way. Another beautiful site of the park is the wooden bridges crossing over Beargrass Creek.

Being rushed for time we didn’t get to explore all that there was to explore which was rather disappointing. Although in hindsight, it is actually exciting to know that there will be more for me to do in the park next time I make a visit.

In the heart of bar central of Louisville (aka where Bardstown Rd. and Baxter Ave. meet), there lays a quaint little establishment known as the Holy Grail. The Holy Grail is an old church in bar central that has been converted into… you guessed it, a bar. The whole place is very blasphemous as you could imagine.

This bar top behind me is just one of the many examples.

For the most part, the bar has a very dark demeanor. But that’s ok, because the people at the bar have a very bright sense of enthusiasm for drinking.

If you continue to make your way to the back of the bar you will find a hidden staircase leading to the choir loft where little boys of Louisville were probably taken advantage of once upon a time.

The choir loft is even darker then the main level but this is where the action really is.

There are several tables for sitting and drinking and being social. I find that this is actually one of most sociable bars in the city of Louisville.

The upstairs even has its own bar. I managed to get this awesome photo with some good flash photography.

As with most people, when I am drinking at a bar I usually have to make room for more beer. So I traversed back downstairs and into the bathroom where the blasphemy took it to a whole new level. Above the pisser I found a portrait of The Last Supper.

I looked around and saw several more takes on the famous Da Vinci work.

Unfortunately ladies, my female friends tell me the ladies room isn’t quite as entertaining.

It was I who only a few months before was saying how I try to not attend my high school’s football games. But I will make one exception to this rule. If they happen to be playing for the state championship I will check it out.

My Scott County Cardinals had the privilege (if that’s what you want to call it), of competing for this years State Championship. Unfortunately, it had to be against number 1 nationally ranked Trinity Shamrocks. These guys show no mercy and Bob Beatty is an asshole.

When you are up several points and there are only a few seconds left in the first half, the respectable thing to do is take a knee. Not throw a bomb down field to try and score another touchdown before half so that you can secure your already secured National Title.

The game was a slobber-knocker. It wasn’t really fun to watch. The Shamrocks wrecked havoc on Scott County. It made the fact that the game was for the Kentucky State Title seem meaningless. It was nice to look around and see the spirit of the fanbase a county school brought to the game though. That’s what really made the trip to Western Kentucky’s campus worth it.

On a side note, I’m not really sure why the game was held at WKU. Typically the state championship match is held at UofL Papa John’s Cardinal Stadium in Louisville.

I tried to snag a photo of the water tower before we went home. It turned out kind of blurry.

Bi-annually you can head 20 minutes down Dixie Highway and check out the adrenaline fulfillment known as the Knob Creek Gun Range Machine Gun Shoot. The other 50 weekends of the year Knob Creek is just a gun range but on these two magical weekends all hell breaks loose.

The event is dedicated to the modern marvel known as the machine gun. Everywhere you look, there is something that will make you think, ‘damn, that’s awesome!’

When you first arrive, you will spend a large chunk of your time just going through the vendor tents before you ever get to the horny stuff. Anything gun related, you can find it here. But I didn’t come here to barter with merchants. I came to get my carnage fix that could have only been provided one other place, the Vietnam war.

It was about 5 o’clock when Hell’s gates opened and the ability to hear quickly diminished. This is when “the line” began to fire several machine guns simultaneously at targets (such as cars, boats and school buses) in a holler already packed full of explosives. The sky turned black.

All of this fury was unleashed after a prayer over the loudspeaker and the signing of the National Anthem of course (God bless the South).

The thing I looked most forward to doing was the Jungle Run. The Jungle Run is a Rambo style free-for-all target competition through the woods. This is where I suffered due to my failure of researching big events in advance. Apparently you have to be there at 9AM at the latest to even get registered for this thing. So unfortunately, my roommate and my hopes of running through the woods blasting away like we are in Contra is going to have to wait until April.

I hear if you pay enough money, you can hop in a helicopter that will fly you above the wood’s trenches while you shoot the chopper’s turret at prearranged explosives. This is only further mayhem that I will plan more meticulously in the future.

It was at this point my roommate and I decided to head back to the Jeep when what do you know, there’s a Vietnam Huey just a football field’s distance away. So of course we hopped in and gave it hell!

Halfway between Louisville and Lexington, off of exit 35 on I-64, sits a modest little establishment known as the Ken-Tex Bar-B-Q. Often times I’ve passed the exit paying little to no attention to the food sign. It wasn’t until recently I actually read the sign and put it together. Ken…Tex… Kentucky food. Texas food. What a great idea!

There’s not a lot to say for the food that your curious mind can’t already being asking itself. Yes, it is authentic Texas bar-b-q with a Kentucky twang. There are plenty of Kentucky grown vegetables to accompany your pulled pork.

Don’t let the building’s exterior fool you, the inside is much smaller than one might imagine. The decorations make you feel more than right at home while the attitude of the servers reminds you that you are in very much in small town Kentucky.

Finally, I will reassert my recommendation for this quaint restaurant if you live in either Lexington or Louisville and have friends that live in the other. It makes for the perfect meetup!

It was a hectic Sunday morning due to the many errands I had to take care of. I also needed to make sure my comrades were not going to bail on me on this trip. I knew this was a concern because of my many previous visits to race day events. And as I anticipated, they bailed at the last minute. But that’s never stopped this one man wolf pack from having a good time.

So I got a late start from Louisville, (One hour and 14 minutes before green flag to be precise), but I made good time for what a four cylinder, unaerodynamic, Jeep Wrangler can do. I also knew that the traffic situation would be nothing compared to the disaster that was the inaugural Nascar race at the speedway. I would think this is because people seem to be less interested in Indy car racing. I can’t seem to figure out why people are less interested, the cars go faster and make louder noises!

I pulled into the general admission parking lot, walked to the ticket booth to pick up my ticket, went to the bathroom, got a drink and went to my seat. The second I got sat in my seat, that green flag was being waved. I patted myself on the back for being good at what I do, impeccably timing things.

I assume many of my readers have never been to Kentucky Speedway and this picture doesn’t quite seem to do justice, yet I feel that it goes unbeknownst that the track is surrounded by some of the most beautifully rolling hills in the Bluegrass state. All this aesthetic pleasure quickly diminishes as the smell of burning rubber, sounds of 200+ mph engines, and the feeling of flying debris sticking to your face quickly engulfs you into the race.

Something also tells me that many of my readers haven’t played Super Mario Kart in years and have forgotten how racing circuits work. You see, the drivers accumulate points in descending order based on the position they finish in a race. After the season is over, the driver with the most points wins the circuit.

Here’s where the beauty lies, Kentucky Speedway is the 2nd-to-last track on the IndyCar series circuit. So it is theoretical that the circuit winner could be determined in Kentucky.

Going into this race it was looking like the circuit champion was going to be crowned here as circuit points leader Will Power needed to finish just a few positions in front of 2nd in points rankings, Dario Franchitti. Somewhere around lap 64, I was starting to think this was the most likely outcome as Power was inching closer and closer to lapping Franchitti who was about 10 positions behind.

Around lap 100, there was a yellow flag and I ran to the bathroom. I returned to see that Power was no longer even on the pole. WTF?!? I asked myself. Apparently something in his car went terribly wrong and he was now running close to last. Even more surprisingly, Franchitti had squeezed his way to first.

The positions remained similar to this until lap 175~ish when Hoosier Ed Carpenter managed to ride up next to Franchitti and produce the most amazing final 25 laps I had ever seen. Each lap the leader swapped back and forth by no more than a foot.

Final Turn, Final Lap of the Kentucky Indy 300

Finally, we reached the last lap and Carpenter had just enough give to pass Franchitti on the final turn and take the victory by 98/10,000 of a second ensuring the need for a race at Las Vegas in two weeks. I was sad that the champ wasn’t crowned today, but with such an exciting finish I was not disappointed!