Category: minieasternloop2017
Nomadiversary Number Three

Nomadiversary Number Three

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Hey Guys!! It’s that time again! Today is our three year nomadiversary!! Three years!! It’s hard to believe we’ve been on this nomadic adventure since 2015. We’ve had quite the year. I thought I’d take you through the highlights and some lowlights of our year.

We started our third year out in Michigan and found out how awesome Michigan really is. None of us were ready to leave and all of us have spoken often of returning. We went in the wrong season…it was bitterly cold for most of our visit, but that didn’t deter us from enjoying the sights and foodies.

Kentucky will always hold a special place in our hearts. We loved the rolling hills of horse pastures, the many distilleries, and the bourbon balls. If I’m being totally honest, I might have a slight obsession with bourbon balls. One of our favorite distilleries to visit is the Woodford Reserve Distillery. The setting, the tour, the chocolate… It has the trifecta of tours!

Tennessee is another state that had a good vibe for us. Nicholas was a willing mural model while we hunted down the many murals that can be found in Nashville.

We also found the foodie scene to be filled with ah-mazing foodies. We still dream of Pepperfire Chicken’s Nashville Hot Chicken.

When in Memphis…you eat BBQ, BBQ, and more BBQ! And that’s exactly what we did! We had BBQ for every meal we could and still don’t feel like we got a sampling of everything the area has to offer.

We have mixed feelings about Memphis. On one hand you’ve got Elvis, Beal St., and BBQ, but on the other hand…we saw so much poverty and homelessness and rough rundown neighborhoods. We weren’t as at ease in Memphis. That kind of takes away some of the sparkle from the experience. We’re glad we went! But, I’m not sure we’ll go back.

Oh, Arkansas…we learned all about chigger nests while we were hiking through Hot Springs National Park. Well, let me clarify that statement…the boys learned all about chigger nests…Jerl and I already knew about them. Somehow, Jerl was the only one unscathed by the massive amount of chiggers we found. The rest of us spent weeks itching all over. Weeks…

We also learned all about the Little Rock Nine and what they went through. If you ever get the chance to visit this National Historic Site, do. It will change you.

I can’t do a review of our third year without mentioning the eclipse! This is an experience we will all be talking about the rest of our lives. We couldn’t have picked a better place to experience this eclipse. The place, the people…and the weather all made it the awesome memory we hold in our hearts.

We found one of our favorite places in Texas this year. Palo Duro State Park just south of Amarillo will take your breath away! We spent several days exploring as much as we could of the “Grand Canyon of Texas” and still didn’t see everything we wanted to.

We got to hike up to the top of Texas on Thanksgiving Day while visiting Guadalupe Mountains National Park. This NPS unit is out in the middle of nowhere and took us over an hour to drive there, but it was worth it. It was a Thanksgiving we will never forget!

We’d been to New Mexico before. We spent several weeks exploring New Mexico back in 2015, but we found new places to explore. Carlsbad Caverns National Park was a pleasant surprise for us. Not only did we thoroughly enjoy Carlsbad, NM…we also loved Carlsbad Caverns NP! If you go prepare to spend the entire day and don’t dismiss the hiking trails above ground.

Sitting Bull Falls National Recreation Area was definitely worth the drive. The falls themselves aren’t really anything to write home about, but the area around the falls was so fun to explore. We spent quite a bit of time picking our way around the pools and rocks at the base of the falls.

New Mexico is on our top five list of states. If I’m being honest, it’s probably in the second spot just behind Alaska. We learned that not all forts have high walls while visiting Fort Union National Monument. That was new for us. All of the other forts we’ve ever visited have been enclosed in high defensible walls so it was very interesting to learn about Fort Union and the role it’s had over the years. We also got to walk on part of the Santa Fe Trail there!

Arizona taught us that we can’t get enough of those red rocks. We could easily spend a season exploring all of the trails in and around Sedona, AZ. It’s something we’re seriously considering…to spend an entire season or two in the Sedona area.

Arizona is also on our top five. The sunsets there are epic. I have to many sunset pics from Arizona and they’re all just as amazing as the one above.

I can’t talk about Arizona and leave out Lost Dutchman State Park. We were able to stay there back in 2015 and again in 2017 during our third year of nomadic travel. Both times have left us wanting more.

While we won’t get to officially add California to our map until June, we’ve been in California for a solid month now. We’ve experienced an earthquake and survived the Santa Ana Winds in an RV. We learned quite a bit about some of the different kinds of palm trees and yuccas while in the Desert Hot Springs area.

We learned about being flexible with our schedule this year. Jerl had to have two eye surgeries and our home-on-wheels needed a new engine so our plans changed quite a bit over our third year.

We didn’t travel as much as we wanted to during our third year, but it is what it is. Life happens and all you can do is make the best of it. We ended up driveway camping at my (Jennie’s) parent’s house for 25 weeks this year, which means we only traveled 27 weeks in total. I feel like we still got quite a bit of exploring done though.

Annnddd…our toad decided to take a joy ride and race us down the highway. We learned sooo much from that experience. We now lock any pin that could be tampered with/bounce loose/fall out. We do not want to have to experience this lesson again. It was nerve-wracking enough the first (and hopefully only) time.

Life is about the little things…all of the little moments that make up the journey. The biggest lesson we learned this year is that life on the road isn’t always easy. It’s not always fun and games and exploring, but like any lifestyle…you have to decide if it’s worth it. For us, right now, it’s still worth it. We still enjoy living in our home-on-wheels and traveling the country like the crazy nomad family that we are.

Thanks for being apart of our journey!

See y’all down the road!

Little Rock, AR

Little Rock, AR

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Hey Guys! Are you ready for the second part of our Arkansas adventures?

The main reason we were in the Little Rock area was to visit the Arkansas State Capitol Building. Y’all know about our rule of visiting the SCB before we can put the state sticker on our map…so we try to make it to the SCB once we get to a new state as soon as we can. Sometimes that’s the first day and sometimes we’ll be in a state for a month before we can get to the Capitol Building.

We enjoyed the Arkansas SCB. It has a lovely dome! There’s something to be said for clean lines and modest decorations. It had not one, but two of these fantastic staircases.

Both of the House and Senate Chambers were locked. We didn’t get to go inside, but I did snap the picture above (right) through the window. I do love stained glass domes! And check out these big brass doors in the picture on the left! I had Alex stand in front of them so you could get a better perspective of their size.

I would have to say the best part of the Arkansas SCB for us was the State Treasury room where they let us hold half a million dollars!! Guys!! Wow!! Have you ever touched so much money at once? We couldn’t pass up the opportunity to hold the money ourselves. We each got to hold the stack of money while the tour guide (I’m so bad with names) told us a bit about the history of the safe. He also gave the boys some perspective on how much money it takes to go to college and raise a kid. I think they were pretty surprised. We asked if he’d ever had anyone try to take off with the money. He said he hadn’t, but they do school fieldtrips there and he had one kid refuse to give the money back to him. I would like to have seen that conversation.

The other place we really wanted to visit in Little Rock is the Little Rock Central High School National Historic Site. One of the things we really love about being nomads is the ability to take the boys to places where our Country’s history actually happened. We feel like it makes a bigger impact to see it in person rather than just reading about it in some book.

We weren’t alive in May of 1957. We’d, of course, learned about what happened at the Little Rock Central High School during that turbulent time, but we hadn’t learned much about it with the watered down version that’s taught in schools. We really didn’t know anything. The Visitor Center laid it out really well. There’s so much information you could spend the better part of a day reading though it all and watching the videos. I’d never heard them called “the Little Rock Nine”, never thought about how brave they must have been, how hard they had to work to stay in school while so many wanted to find reasons to kick them out, and how they were representing an entire group of people. The whole world was watching these nine high school kids…just waiting to see if they failed or succeeded. That’s a lot of pressure. Reading about each of their stories was eye opening for all of us.

The Little Rock Central High School National Historic Site includes the Visitor Center, this gas station where protests took place, and the High School itself.  The high school is still a working school so the only way to tour it is on a Ranger led tour. We, unfortunately, didn’t get to go on one. I would have liked to, but timing didn’t work out.

We made a quick stop at The Old Mill Park which is a re-creation of an 1880s water-powered grist mill. You might recognize it from the opening scenes of “Gone With The Wind”. It was a busy little park! You can go into the mill and look around. The Old Mill Park is dedicated to the memory of the Arkansas pioneers. The park is nestled at the end of a finger of Lake Number Two.

If you’ve followed us for long, you know that we love our burgers. We found a great foodie spot called Big Orange. The burger above (on the right) is the Farmer’s Burger with a fried egg, bacon, lettuce, tomato, red onion, and aioli. It must have been good because it didn’t last long! I had the Smashed Avocado Burger with avocado, pepper salad, Havarti cheese, lettuce, tomato, and garlic aioli! It was delicious! Those fries you see in the background are the State Fair Fries which include chili, cheese dip, two different kinds of shredded cheese, pickled jalapenos, fresh jalapenos and red onion. They were totally not on my diet and I didn’t care at all…they were definitely worth it!

Pretties! There were tons of them! I’m sure I took way more pictures of pretties than I needed to.

That’s all for Arkansas! See y’all down the road!

This is the last post for the #minieasternloop2017

Hot Springs National Park

Hot Springs National Park

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Hey Guys! We only spent one week in Arkansas, but we crammed so much into that one week I’m going to break up our Arkansas adventures into two separate posts. We’re going to start with Hot Springs National Park!

Confession:  I didn’t really want to go to Hot Springs National Park. I couldn’t figure out what could be so interesting about a hot spring. Did I really want to devote an entire stop to this area? When we visit some place it’s not just for a weekend. We devote an entire week to two weeks to each stop. I questioned whether or not this National Park was worth the hassle of staying so far from Little Rock (which is the main reason we were going to be in the area). Now, don’t get me wrong…we love our National Parks…it’s just that usually, National Parks are…well…bigger. I’m talking about Parks and not Monuments or Historic Sites or Battlefields.

Fordyce Bathhouse/National Park Visitor Center.

The day we went it was soooo busy. Finding a parking spot wasn’t easy. Let’s just say, I was still skeptical when we walked into the Fordyce Bathhouse. It wasn’t looking so hot for Hot Springs, so far.

Ladies’ Bath Hall.

The boys grabbed their Junior Ranger booklets and we set about exploring the museum in the Fordyce Bathhouse. The National Park Service has restored quite a bit of the Fordyce to what it looked like back in it’s heyday. In the picture above you can see one of the stalls used for a women’s bath. The uniform you see is what the attendant would have worn.

Treatment room.

The museum in Fordyce Bathhouse lets you walk through the “ritual” of a bathhouse visit. These visits were a three week long regime of daily baths, workouts in the state-of-the-art gymnasium,

massages with the newest devices and tinctures, and a variety of specialty treatments.

 The room above was for podiatry…all afflictions dealing with the feet.

When all that steam from the hot spring water ruined your hair, you could stop into the beauty salon and have it fixed. Check out all of the old beauty equipment!

During the mid- 19th century, Hot Springs catered to the wealth of America. People came from all over the country to have a spa vacation at one of the famous Bathhouse Row’s “temple of health and beauty”, but the wealthy weren’t the only people lining up to get into one of the spas. The mineral rich, hot spring water was said to be a cure for what ails you no matter what that ailment was. Many people came for physical therapy in specialized tubs like the one above.

While the bedrooms were on the small side, the bathhouses offered ample rooms and activities to allow for socializing in the evenings. The mannequin in the photo above kind of gave me the creeps. I really kept expecting it to move. Maybe I’ve watched too much sci-fy.

The first bathhouses weren’t really bathhouses. They were wooden planks surrounding excavated rock where the bathers would soak their feet. The first “bathhouse” which was more like a log cabin was built in 1830. During the height of Bathhouse Row, the spas were very elegant with stained glass, fountains, and works of art to make an establishment that rivaled those found in Europe.

Please do not urinate in vapor. The things you have to tell people not to do.

 There was a time when the opulent spas attracted not only the wealthy, but also sports heroes, politicians, and even mobsters. Hot Springs became just as known for gambling, prostitution, and organized crime as it was known for its water. The success of Bathhouse row has gone up and down through the years. During the 1940s there were twenty-four bathhouses in operation. Only two spas are operating today. You can go to the Quapaw or Buckstaff Bathhouses and soak in the hot spring water for a fee. The Buckstaff has been in continuous operation since it opened its doors back in 1912 and is the only continuously run bathhouse on Bathhouse Row.

While most of the springs have been covered and sealed off to prevent contamination, you can still see some springs bubbling up and running down the mountain to collect in pools of 140° water.  So, why is the water so hot? It may surprise you to find out that Hot Springs isn’t in a volcanic region. The water you see in the picture above started its journey about 4,000 years ago as rain water seeping into the ground. The rain water is heated naturally by rock that’s under immense pressure at a rate of 4° every 300 feet. The rain water is then forced back up though fractures where it will take about a year to return to surface. The park collects 700,000 gallons a day. Here’s a tidbit for you: the water that you see flowing in the picture above started as rain water when the ancient Egyptians were still building the pyramids!

Not far from Bathhouse Row is the Hot Springs Mountain Tower where you can get a bird’s eye view of the area. Not a bad view!

There are even some hiking trails around! We hiked to Goat Rock to check out the view. It was an easy one mile TAB (there and back) trial, but it was so incredibly hot. We ran into an older couple who had hiked from a nearby campground. They were lost with no water and no map, but didn’t seem to be worried about it. Guys, if you’re going to hike…have a map and please carry water. Be smart about your explorations.

We saw tons of these little lizards during our hike. They were everywhere! We even ran into this little lady. Can you see her in the left picture? This little deer is a master at hiding and camouflage.

Ready for some pretties? There were quite a few different pretties around during our hike. We were there late Spring, early Summer. Some pretties were still just waking up. I know, I know…the bottom left picture is of a weed. But, it reminds me of a serious case of bedhead. 😛

We had a great day learning about the springs, tasting the water, and exploring Hot Springs National Park! Even though it’s the smallest and one of the oldest National Parks, there’s quite a bit to see and do. We easily filled an entire day and could have spent another day hiking more. So, what did we learn? Sometimes there’s more than meets the eye when it comes to National Parks.

See y’all down the road!

#minieasternloop2017

Pizza Roundup Rod’s Pizza Cellar

Pizza Roundup Rod’s Pizza Cellar

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To my fellow pizza lovers I bring a pizza post from Hot Springs, AR.

Rod’s Pizza Cellar is a really good pizza place! The décor reminded me of the typical pizza parlor with green and red checked décor.

Rod’s was made on July 4th and has been open for 42 years.

The pizza that started it all for Don’s Pizza Cellar is The Godfather pizza and it is really good. The Godfather pizza has Canadian bacon, cheese, sauce, Italian sausage and peppers. The cheese is on top of all of the toppings to help hold it all on the pizza.

The restaurant itself is pretty clean and the food is good, did I mention Don’s has a buffet? Well, it is a good buffet with a nice selection of all the pizzas Don’s Pizza Cellar has to offer.

Dessert was also offered with the buffet. My favorite was the strawberry shortcake!

You don’t like buffets? No problem! They also have a full menu you can order from!

Now with all that, I’m giving Rod’s Pizza Cellar a 5 star review.

See y’all next time on…

Pizza Street!!

World of Zoo Memphis Zoo

World of Zoo Memphis Zoo

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To my fellow pizza… wait, that’s a different post.

To my fellow animal lovers, I bring a post from Memphis, TN. It is really cool walking up to the zoo, looks all Egyptian and neat.

At the Memphis Zoo, they have all kinds of animals, like leopards,

red pandas,

birds, and

cheetahs.

All the animals at the Memphis Zoo seemed to be comfortable in their enclosures.

The zoo was nice and clean too.

They have loads of neat animals. We really liked the hippo habitat because you could get a look above,  ground level, and even below the water! Which means you’re for sure going to see the hippos!

There were several baby animals when we visited! I love how fuzzy the baby orangutan looks!

The exhibits looked nice and clean and the staff were all nice.

At the Memphis Zoo they have really impressive Lego sculptures! They’re HUGE!! Look how detailed the Lego sculptures are! Amazing! Can you imagine putting one of these together?

Each exhibit is decorated to match the cultural area of the world that the animals are found in.

 The Memphis Zoo is one of the only four US Zoos to have the Giant Pandas. The Memphis Zoo was granted permission by the Chinese government to care for YaYa and LeLe in 2003.

I got to get really close to a giant panda, and that was awesome because giant pandas are my favorite animals!

The Memphis Zoo houses over 3,500 animals on 76 acres of land. That’s a lot of animals!! But don’t worry, you only have to walk about 2 miles to see all of the exhibits and there’s a tram tour you can take if it’s too hot or you’re hurt and can’t walk.

They also have, drum roll please, Polar Bears!! This polar bear wasn’t as active as the one in St. Louis but it was still cool.

The zoo opened in 1906 and is rated as one of the top 5 zoos in the U.S.A and I can see why. Healthy, happy animals with cool habitats make a great zoo.

Well I think that about sums it all up, I give Memphis Zoo a 5 star review.

See y’all at the Zoo!!

All Roads Lead To Memphis

All Roads Lead To Memphis

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Hey Guys!! We spent two weeks eating in …I mean…exploring the Memphis area!

The day we ate at Central BBQ a huge storm blew through Memphis. When we got there, it wasn’t storming yet and there were quite a few people at the outside dining area enjoying some live music. We opted to eat inside and boy howdy…I’m sooo glad we did! We’d just gotten our food when the heavens opened up and tried to blow everything outside away with rain and wind!

We all got different things to try at Central BBQ. I got a smoked chicken sandwich and I have to say…it was probably one of the best I’ve had. I’m particular about my BBQ sauce. I like my sauce to have a nice smoky, savory flavor with a hint of sweetness. Central BBQs sauce was just that for me. None of us found anything to really complain about…other than the tons of other people in our way. It was super busy even with the storm!

The other BBQ place we tried was Corky’s. Jerl couldn’t say enough good things about these ribs. He especially loved the area toward the middle where the wet and dry kind of mixed together. The only bad thing I have to say about Corky’s is that their sides are really small. You can see them and the ribs in the picture above. I feel like for the price…there should be some more food on that plate.

We’d just come from falling in love with the Nashville Hot Chicken so we gave Gus’s Fried Chicken a whirl. Guys, it was so stinkin’ good!! And! It was completely different than the Hot Chicken we got in Nashville. The crust was different, the spice was different…but it was still nice and juicy and full of flavor! You might remember at PepperFire you could choose your level of spice…you have the choice of no spice, all the way up to melt yo’ face off spice. At Gus’s there’s only one level and it’s not bad. You could tell there was spice, but it was more flavor than heat.

Gibson’s Tastee Donuts is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. We went twice in the two weeks we were in Memphis and there was a line both times. Now, I’m not sure if it was because I hadn’t had a donut in so long or if Gibson’s makes their donuts with crack…I don’t know…but these were some of the best I’ve had.

 The last foodie place is called Dyer’s. This burger place has been open for over a century serving up deep fried burgers and fries! These burgers aren’t gourmet…these are greasy diner burgers and they’re pretty darn good! During my foodie research, I learned about Dyer’s fried pb&j dessert…and…we, of course, had to try one, right? It felt oh, so wrong to eat…but oh my gosh…it was really tasty!

Are you beginning to think all we did for two weeks was eat? LOL! We kind of did…but we did so some other stuff too, I promise!! Ha!

We took a stroll down Beale Street which is a melting pot of jazz, blues, rock n’ roll, and gospel. The street is lined with clubs, shops, and foodies.

A. Schwab is a general store that has been in business on Beale St since 1876 and is the only original business remaining on Beale St today. Most items in A. Schwab are your typical general store type things. The custom made Hoo Doo kits are something I hadn’t seen before, though. There was a whole section full of hoo doo items to make your own custom charms and potions. It was kind of fun looking through all of the items but, it’s not something I would ever buy. On one side of the store was an old fashioned soda counter that is still in operation. A. Schwab is a neat store to spend some time in while getting out of the heat.

There were several of these guitars sprinkled throughout Beale St. This one was our favorite. Nicholas posed for me so you could see how big the guitar is!

We went to check out Graceland. If you don’t know who lived there…I’m not sure I can be your friend anymore. We didn’t want to fork over $50 a piece for each of us to take a tour of it, so this was as close to the home of Elvis as we got. Total bummer.

We made it to the Memphis Zoo! It was fantastic! The Memphis Zoo is solidly in our top five…it’s battling it out with the Houston Zoo for our number one spot. Nicholas is doing a Zoo Review so I’ll let him fill you in on all of the zoo details in a post next week, but I do want to share this Lego sculpture with you! How cool is that?!? And the panda exhibit was a really cool one.

The RV park we stayed at was right on the banks of the Mississippi River so we got to spend two weeks watching the barges go up and down the river! We loved taking walks by the river several times a day. Some parks are easy to get some walking in and some parks are almost impossible to get any kind of mileage in. While the river was pretty to look at during the day, I think I prefer it right at sunset when the colors in the sky were reflected off the water.

These pretties were in our park. I really enjoyed walking by them everyday! Y’all know I’m a sucker for the pretties.

That’s it, Guys! We had a blast exploring and eating our way through Memphis!! The boys have already made plans to visit…and eat there again!!

See y’all down the road!

#minieasternloop2017

Pizza Roundup 5Points

Pizza Roundup 5Points

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To my fellow pizza lovers, I bring to you a post from Nashville, TN.

In Nashville there is a good pizza place named 5Points, now this place has pizza by the slice (New York style) that is bigger than my head! Cut from a 20 inch pizza!

They also have delicious strombolies

and pizza, of course!

They have some pretty darn good garlic knots, not as good as Potsi though.

The décor is nice and the service is good, I didn’t need the bathroom so I couldn’t tell ya if it’s clean.

With all that I think that 5Points deserves 5stars.

See y’all next time on…

Pizza Street!!

That was a big slice a pizza!

Nashville

Nashville

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Hey Guys!! Welcome to the land of boots, Tennessee Hot Chicken, and country music!

We were a little worried about the park we stayed in during our stay in the Nashville area. When you look at it on the Googles you can see that it has railroad tracks on one side and highways on two sides (it’s shaped like a triangle). In my mind I had us lying awake all night listening to the sound of trains or traffic. We ended up by one of the highways which was a blessing. The train tracks were busy. We didn’t really notice the train noise where we were, but the spots right beside the tracks…I’m guessing they didn’t get a whole lot of sleep. It was a busy park and we were all crammed in. I managed to snap the picture above while we were in between neighbors.

We made it to our 41st State Capitol Building in our 42nd state! Bonus points to anyone who can tell me why the numbers don’t match up!

The Tennessee SCB was small, didn’t have a dome, and was dark. It was hard to get good pictures of anything. The bottom floor was painted in dark browns and the lighting was dim. You can see it in the right picture above. I know I’m shooting toward a bright door…but seriously guys, this is what it was like walking through it. I love this spiral staircase in the library in the left picture!

Tennessee is only the second SCB out of 41 that had a wonderful balcony we could actually go out on! I love it when we find something different in a SCB!

Nashville has several great murals! We only sought out two of them and there was a line at both to get photos. What a great idea to have an interactive murals! Nicholas volunteered to be my assistant for both murals. He’s a pretty good photo buddy.

We stopped by the Grand Ole Opry one afternoon to check it out. We didn’t get to do a tour or stay for a show, but we did get to look at the building and hit the gift shop! I went to the Grand Ole Opry about thirty years ago with my parents. I can’t believe how much the area has changed! It was during that first visit that I had my first Goo Goo Cluster. We had to get a few Goo Goo Clusters while we were in the gift shop…purely for nostalgia… *wink, wink*

Nashville is known as the “Athens of the South” so they decided to build a replica of the Parthenon for the 1897 Tennessee Centennial Exposition. Inside the Nashville Parthenon stands a 41’10” tall Athena. To give you a little size perspective, Nike who is standing in Athena’s right hand and is 6’4″. We got there right when the building was opening and were lucky enough to get some shots in before the mass of people made it up to the statue.

I love the tile work on the outside! The building underwent a major renovation in 1920 and reopened to the public in 1931.

We, of course, found some foodies! Nashville is a big foodie town. Our first foodie find was at a place called The Pharmacy Burger Parlor. We waited an hour to get into this place…but check out that burger! This Stroganoff Burger is solidly in my top five burgers. The mushroom stroganoff béchamel sauce was ah-mazing!! My eyes might have just rolled to the back of my head when I first tasted it.

We would never have found Pepperfire Hot Chicken if our waiter at The Pharmacy hadn’t suggested it. I didn’t even know that Tennessee Hot Chicken was a thing…but let me tell you…we know now and we are fans! So, what you’re looking at in the right picture above is a deep fried grilled cheese sandwich with two Pepperfire chicken strips on top of it. Guys…we loved this place so much we ate here twice in one week. Alex and Nicholas both loved the chicken and waffles meal known as the AppleFire (in the left picture). Now, don’t worry, if you’re not into spice, Pepperfire offers a Southern style aka no heat option. There are seven different levels of heat. I got the mild and it was plenty spicy. We were told to go down a level from what you can usually handle. I think that was sound advice. I can handle some heat and my mild was just right.

I found some pretties! The ones above were in the RV park we stayed in. There was an entire row of these beauties ranging in color from purple to this light pink.

We really enjoyed our time in Nashville, TN. The city reminded us a little of Austin, TX. They both have that laid-back, foodie, hip vibe. We don’t usually care for the state capitol city, but I have no doubt we’ll revisit Nashville!

See y’all down the road!

#minieasternloop2017

Bourbon And More Part Two

Bourbon And More Part Two

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Hey Guys!! Are you ready for Part Two? While we spent a good portion of our time exploring distilleries, that’s not all we did while we were in Kentucky! I know that’s what you were thinking! ;-P

We stayed at a small RV park right outside of Bardstown, KY. It was just close enough to everything to be convenient and just far enough away from everything that we didn’t feel like we were in town.

Abraham Lincoln was born in Kentucky. The place where he was born is now a National Park. About where the cabin he was born in sat, is now a memorial. Inside the memorial you can see a cabin that is of the same time period taken from the area, but it’s not the actual cabin Lincoln was born in. We learned about Lincoln’s early years before he moved to Illinois while we were there doing the Junior Rangering. It was a nice little park and we went on a beautiful day!

We also made it to Mammoth Cave National Park where the boys got some more Junior Rangering done!

Sooo…I don’t know if you know this…but caves are really dark. I know, I know…it was a shock to us too. Ha! Just kidding. I took loads of pictures in the hopes that at least a few would come out. I tried, Guys! I really did. We signed up for a cave tour before we went. We wanted to do more than one, but apparently, cave tours are super popular and we waited too long. Bummer. Our tour group was huge…close to 100 people. We weren’t really expecting that. Somehow we ended up at the back of the group and every time we got to the next Ranger stop, the Ranger had already finished up talking. We caught the tail end of her spiel a couple of times, but not enough to really tell you about. This was the first time we’ve had that happen…and honestly…we didn’t like it. At all. We are a family of total nerds…one of the best things about the tours for us is the learning… The NPS really needs to have smaller cave tour groups.

At one point during the tour the Ranger turned off all the lights and talked to us by lantern light so we could see what the miners were really dealing with. It was DARK!

One of the best parts of the tour was the Fat Man’s Misery! Nicholas had no problems with this super narrow section of the cave. And Guys, it was really narrow.

Right after the Fat Man’s Misery is the Tall Man’s Misery where even I (at my 5’1″ …with the right shoes on…height) had to bend over. It’s hard to see, but the guy in the picture was the guy right behind me during the tour. He had to have been close to 6’4″ and had a really difficult time with both the Misery sections. He was nice enough to pause and let me snap his picture. This cave tour is not for someone who struggles with claustrophobia.

We’d only been in one other cave and then a lava tube when we did this cave tour so we didn’t really know what to expect with Mammoth Cave. We would like to go back sometime and do some of the other tours that we missed out on. Maybe if we go during the off season the tour groups will be smaller?

Bardstown is a pretty small town, but we did find a couple of foodies. In the left picture above is a Southern Burger with pimento cheese and fried green tomatoes. Now, you might remember I had something similar to this in Charleston, SC and it was pretty darn amazing! I had high hopes for this Southern Burger…it was decent. It would have been a lot better if the pimento cheese wasn’t so sweet. Honestly, it left me wanting to go back to SC and get the other burger. If you look at the mess of stuff in the right picture…you’ll see what is called a Kentucky Hot Brown! And it’s pretty darn good!! It’s hard to tell from the picture above, but it’s an open-faced sandwich with ham, turkey, and bacon. If you get the chance to try one, take it!! You won’t regret it!

Are you ready for some pretties?! I took quite a few pictures of pretties, but I’ll just share a few with you!

I love the colors of the one in the bottom right picture!!

That’s it for our Kentucky adventures!!

See y’all down the road!

#minieasternloop2017

Bourbon And More Part One

Bourbon And More Part One

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Hey Guys!! We spent two weeks in the Bourbon Capitol of the World! You might know it better as Bardstown, KY. 95% of all bourbon sold today is made in Kentucky.

We did so much during our two weeks in this area, I’m going to break it up into two different posts. Let’s get started with post one!

There is an official Kentucky Bourbon Trail that includes ten distilleries spread out all over Kentucky. If you pick up a KBT passport you can get a stamp at each distillery as you visit it. When you’ve got all ten stamps you can turn in the passport at the old court house in Bardstown to receive a free shirt! We hadn’t planned on doing the whole trail, but who can pass up a free shirt?

Some of the distilleries were in town, but several were out in the country. The road in the picture above is very typical of the roads we traveled while in Kentucky! Very windy and very narrow…pretty much one lane. I’m so glad we didn’t have to take the RV down all of these roads!

To legally be considered bourbon, a whiskey must be made from a grain mixture that is at least 51% corn. We ended up going to twelve different distilleries. We didn’t do tours at all of them. We skipped tours at three due to timing.

Whiskey used to be so valuable that it could be traded for goods and services, just like money. We were able to see different parts of the brewing process at the different distilleries. At the one in the picture above, we were able to taste the mash while it was brewing. It was kind of like a tasteless soggy oatmeal…not very good.

To be considered bourbon, the whiskey has to be distilled to no more than 160 proof. The percentage of alcohol that evaporates during the aging process is called “the angel’s share”.

My favorite part of the distillery tour is getting to visit the rick houses. The rick house is where the bourbon barrels are stored to age. Each distillery has their own way of aging a barrel. In fact, each distillery usually has several different ways depending on the type of bourbon they’re working on.

A standard bourbon barrel holds 53 gallons of whiskey.

During Prohibition, the Government Revenuers who were tasked with finding illegal moonshine stills could look in the forest for trees that were starting to turn black. Check out the tree in the right picture above. The bark is completely black with a sugar mold that’s the bi-product of the distilling process. Due to the tale-tell black sugar mold giving away their locations… the moonshine distillers would have to constantly move their operation because of the black sugar mold that grew on everything near the still. And I do mean everything…check out the lamp in the left picture above. I can’t imagine living close to one of these big distillers and trying to keep the sugar mold off my stuff!

A bourbon barrel can only be used once to age bourbon, but distilleries ship used bourbon barrels to Scotland and Ireland for the use in the maturation of Scotch and Irish whiskey. Most of the rick houses are painted black to help hide the sugar mold.

During Prohibition, the only way to get whiskey was to get a prescription from your doctor. Whiskey is good for what ails you. *wink, wink* Before Prohibition there were around 2,000 distilleries in Kentucky. During Prohibition six distilleries obtained a license to make medicinal whiskey. During the years of Prohibition, Kentucky saw some of it’s sickest days on record. There were right around 6 million prescriptions written for “medicinal” whiskey in thirteen years for a population of less than 1 million. During World War II the government used bourbon distilleries to make fuel alcohol and penicillin.

Did you know:  All bourbon is whiskey, but not all whiskey is bourbon.

Maker’s Mark Distillery is one of our favorite tours. The grounds are nice, the tours are interesting and the tasting is fun.

A bourbon barrel has to made of oak. Most of the trees come from the forests of Missouri.

My favorite part of the Maker’s Mark tour is this hallway! The whole ceiling in that hallway is filled with Chihuly glass! It’s absolutely gorgeous!!

Each bottle of Maker’s Mark is hand-dipped in red wax. The other very cool thing about the Maker’s Mark Distillery is getting to dip your own bottle! Jerl was pretty excited to dip a bottle and then he was torn between saving the whole bottle or drinking it. Ha!

Kentucky is the birthplace of bourbon, but it’s not the only state that makes it. Kentucky’s bourbon distilleries fill over 1 million barrels with bourbon a single year.

The Jim Beam Distillery is another one that stands out for us. The campus is set up like an old farm stead. The tasting at Jim Beam was different from all of the other tours. Have you ever seen a bourbon dispenser? It was a first for us too. While the dispenser was cool…I liked the other tasting better because you were given information about what you were tasting and tips on how to taste it.

Did you know:  Bourbon barrels must be charred in order to be compliant with the laws of making bourbon. We ended our Bourbon Trail Adventures with a trip to the Kentucky Cooperage where most of the barrels are made. The picture above is actually from the Bulleit Distillery. We weren’t allowed to take any pictures at the cooperage. But Guys…it was really cool! If you ever get a chance to go visit one…do! We got to see the barrels made from logs to barrels…we got to see them getting charred and then tested to make sure they weren’t going to leak! The cooperage was one of the highlights of our entire time in Kentucky!

Un-aged bourbon goes by many names here are a few: white dog, moonshine, hooch, and white lightening. Every distillery we went to we ended up with something…as you can imagine, we accumulated quite a collection of souvenirs. Now to figure out where we’re going to store all of these souvenirs. Ha!

Rebecca Ruth is said to be the original maker of the bourbon ball. There are a few different varieties of them, but the chocolate is my favorite. And…not all bourbon balls are the same. They vary in taste and texture quite a bit. I, of course, had to try them every time they were available and let me tell you…some are amazing and some are…well…not.

Each year almost 120,000 mint juleps are sold during the two-day event known as the Kentucky Oaks and the Kentucky Derby. I’ve always been curious about mint juleps and at one of the distilleries we came across a mint julep mix in a small bottle. I had high hopes…I’ll let my face tell you what I thought about it. I’m so glad it was just a small single serve bottle. Maybe a mix from a different distillery would be better? It’ll be awhile before I get the urge to try it again.

September is National Bourbon Heritage Month…it’s also my birthday…if anyone is looking for gift ideas…I did find this little gem. Bourbon Cream by Buffalo Trace is…well, it’s a little magical. I like a little of this in some root beer…it’s soooo good! It’s like a grown up root beer float!

Kentucky cows are very happy cows. The grain mash that’s left over after the distilling process is called distiller’s grain (slop) and is given to farms to feed their cows.

And…then there’s the ice cream. It’s mine. Aaaallll mmmiiinnnne!!! *insert evil laugh here* But seriously, the bourbon ball ice cream should be illegal.

That’s it for the Kentucky Bourbon Trial! Stay tuned for Bourbon and More Part Two!!

See y’all down the road!

#minieasterntrail2017