Day 23 - Louisville slugging

 

A day of touristing instead of driving. Tour guide Betsy got us to the Blue Dog Bakery for our morning cappuccino and pastry and then to old downtown Louisville. Chartered in 1780 by Virginia governor Thomas Jefferson, the site at the head of the Falls of the Ohio River made it a natural transportation and distribution center. Today, the most notable sights in the old town are the many bourbon tasting rooms (part of the Urban Bourbon Trail) and the cast iron building facades. Used in the mid to late 1800s, the slim columns enabled by this material give a light, airy appearance to the buildings. Many of these buildings in other cities were replaced in the mid1900s, but Louisville wasn't thriving at the time and the buildings were thankfully left in service.

Among the prominent museums in Louisville are the Muhammad Ali Center, which we didn't visit, and the Louisville Slugger Museum and Factory, which we did. It was awesome! The huge bat on Main Street marks the site and leads visitors through exhibits that just get better and better. Bats from legendary hitters dating back to early 1900s, the Negro Leagues, and through to today are on display. The factory tour showed how trees are selected from plots along the New York-Pennsylvania border, cut into 40-inch lengths, split (not cut) and then trimmed. The best 15% of the wood is used for professional bats (over 10,000 per year) and the rest go for their retail line. The smell of the new-cut ash, birch and maple filled the factory and we saw the full process from cutting out the rounds to shaping on the lathes to finishing, painting and stamping. 

Bats from some of the biggest names in the game were racked and available for swinging. Here is Betty having a cut with Edgar Martinez's. Note that she's down close to the knob and swinging for the fence.

On our bourbon walking tour, we stopped at the Michter's whiskey tasting room just across the street and had a lick of four bourbons, four ryes and two whiskeys. We all agreed on a favorite (Barrel Strength Toasted Barrel Finish Rye) but were sad to learn that we couldn't buy it - too much demand and too expensive for them to keep at a tourist tasting room. Hmm. We were saved from ourselves.

You can never go wrong with lunch at an Irish pub. Today we stopped at Molly Malone's, had a Guiness or a Harp and shared some fresh cockles and mussels from the Ohio River - well, no; roasted brussels sprouts and black bean hummus.

Dinner was at the Havana Cuban restaurant along Bardstown Road. There was a great vibe in the area - lots of young and old at street-side tables in the warm evening air. A perfect end to our first day with Betsy in Louisville.

To carry on the B-B-B theme, the book recommendation today is about bourbon. Pappyland: A Story of Family, Fine Bourbon and Things That Last, by Wright Thompson

In honor of Irish Pubs everywhere and in dedication to Steve Perkins we give you a rendition of Molly Malone. Molly Malone - Patty Gurdy (Irish Traditional / epic Hurdy-Gurdy Music) - YouTube