Our First Day of Caching in Frankfort 4/29/2009

Mom and I, after our day of work, took off this morning to do some caching around the Frankfort area. Our first 2 caches were in the small town of North Fork and I do mean small as if you blinked your eyes on the way through you would miss it, a four corners and that's all. The first cache was at the North Forks Baptist Church in the cemetery. Next was a cache at Switzer Covered Bridge. Franklin County's only covered bridge spans North Elkhorn Creek and is 120 ft. long and 11 ft. wide. It was built by George Hockensmith circa 1855. each entrance has a sawtooth edge; the lattice is pinned with trunnels (treenasil). Restored in 1906 by Louis Bower. Closed to traffic in 1954. This bridge was listed on the National Register of Historic Places, 1974. The Switzer Bridge once carried KY 1262 across North Elkhorn Creek at Switzer in eastern Franklin county. It is a 120 foot long Howe truss design built in 1855 and restored in 1906 and again in 1990. On March 1, 1997 the bridge was washed away in a flood and was restored in 1998.
Then it was back into Frankfort for a cache outside the Jim Beam Kentucky Whiskey plant and the next was in Lakeview Park in the woods. Then we drove to Cove Spring park for a Earthcache at Hurst Falls in the park. The park/nature preserve consists of approximately 100 acres of wetlands, streams, springs, waterfalls, forested ravines and other natural and historic features.
Then we went to Greenhill Cemetery where we had a cache that brought us to the only Kentucky African American Civil War Veteran's Monument. Erected by the Colored Women's Relief Corps No. 8 of the Grand Army of the Republic in 1924, this marker is the only monument to Kentucky African American Civil War soldiers and one of only four monuments to African American Civil War soldiers in the nation. The monument is a simple tapered shaft, ornamented with the seal of the Grand Army of the Republic on the front and featuring the names of 142 African American soldiers from central Kentucky on the other three sides. The contribution of African American Civil War soldiers in Kentucky was great, comprising nearly one-third of all Kentuckians who served in the Union forces. This is particularly remarkable since the recruiting of African American soldiers was not allowed in Kentucky until March 1, 1864 (some African Americans who wished to enlist before this time, did so out-of-state). 23,703 Kentucky African Americans served in 23 Union regiments. Impressively, only the state of Louisiana provided more black recruits than Kentucky. Enlistment in the United States Colored Troops (USCT) also granted emancipation for enslaved Kentuckians, though attempting to flee to one of the ten USCT recruiting camps in the state was a very difficult and dangerous task for a fugitive slave.
Then it was on to East Frankfort Park and a cache in the woods near a disc golf course. After we found the cache we dog Muffy and Raggs to the dog park and let them loose so they could run around awhile, which they seemed to like.
Next 3 caches were NRV with one in a telephone booth, one near a neighborhood watch sign and the last in a small over grown park on the campus of Kentucky State University. After we finished it off back to the RV and lunch and Mom did the blogs and we watched TV till dinner. We ate and that was our day. Well until next time we love and miss you all. Mom & Dad

HAPPY BIRTHDAY NIKKI 4/29/2009

MOM AND I WOULD LIKE TO WISH NIKKI A VERY VERY HAPPY BIRTHDAY AND HOPE SHE HAS A WONDERFUL DAY.

LOVE MOM & DAD

Hanging Around & Some Cleaning 4/28/2009

Mom and I just hung around the RV today as we had been putting off some things we really needed to do for awhile now. I cleaned all the bugs off the front end of the RV and washed all the windows inside and out. Mom took all the foam off the dash and cleaned it completely and dusted and vacuumed. After she was done she went and got her haircut and went to the Dollar Store and looked in a few of the shops in a small shopping center. After I was done I worked some more on Sundays blog and the pictures for it. As you can see there were a lot of those. Mom brought back subs from a new place we saw when we drove in on Monday. It was Penn Station East Coast Subs and they were great and we plan on having them again before we leave for dinner. After that we watched TV and killed the rest of the afternoon, had dinner and called it a day. Well until next time we love you all. Mom & Dad

Moving Day to Frankfort, KY the State Capital 4/28/2009

We were off to Frankfort, KY this morning, only about a 85 mile drive so we didn't leave till about 10:00. It wasn't a bad drive although the Bluegrass Parkway was a very nice road until we hit a stretch of concrete which was absolutely horrible. I don't know why they insist on building roads out of concrete except where they don't get any frost. The road had heaved were lots of big holes all over and I really thought we were going to have a tire problem it was so bad. We got here about 12:30 and would have been here sooner if I hadn't had to sit in a gas station and wait for someone to come out and move their car so I could make the exit turn. We got all set up and the Elkhorn Campgrounds seems very nice. They have clean bathrooms, lots of cable TV stations, Wi-Fi now that I got it to work and are having a Derby party on Saturday. After we got set up we took a trip to the grocery store to stock up and I came back and cleaned the bugs off the front of the RV. By that time it was dinner time so we ate and called it a day. Well until next time we love you all. Mom & Dad

Finally the End of the Road in Louisville 4/27/2009

After finishing our caches we just drove around Louisville to see if we missed somethin or not. It really doesn't seem possible that we did after all the pictures I took. Some of the sites you will find pictures for in thie section are:
The historic Calvary Episcopal Church was established in 1857 and is located at 821 South 4th Street Louisville, Kentucky. This stone gothic church was built in Old Louisville in 1888 and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.


Presentation Academy, founded in 1831 by the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth and located at 861 South Fourth Street, is the oldest continuously operating high school in Louisville. A Catholic, college-preparatory high school for girls, Presentation Academy emphasizes excellence in academics, leadership and personal development. The programs at Presentation are designed to enhance the student’s academic, physical, cultural, spiritual and social growth, thus preparing her to become a mature Christian young woman and a responsible citizen.


The Bluegrass Brewing Co which brews award winning micro brewed beers. American Pale Ale, Altbier, Raspberry Meade, Dark Star Porter and Nut Brown Ale are always on tap and some of the seasonal beers are Frambozen, Summer Wheat, Bourbon Barrel Big Brown, German Pilsner, The Bockwermert (Maibock) and Nut Brown Lambic. The basic building block of beer is two-row barley malt, which has been prepared for use in brewing at a malting house.
Various specialty barley malts, such as Vienna, chocolate and black patent, are used where dictated by stylistic considerations and add color, flavor and texture to the finished beer. Wheat, oatmeal and rye also can be selected for use by the brewer, again depending on the style of beer being brewed.
The barley malt is cracked, and this grist is poured into the mash tun. Hot water is added, creating the thick, porridge-like mash. When the optimal temperature of the mash is reached, the flow of water is stopped and the mash allowed to rest. During this time, starches in the grains are converted into simple sugars and absorbed into the water. Later, yeast will transform these sugars into alcohol.
At the completion of the mash, the liquid (now called wort), is transferred into the brew kettle and boiled. During this time the hops are added. Hops are the ideal bittering agent for beer, serving to balance the sweetness of the barley malt and to add flavor and aroma to the beer.
When the boil has concluded, the wort is pumped through the wort chiller. It is necessary to cool the wort because yeast cannot survive in excessive heat.
Once cooled, the wort is poured into the fermenters and the yeast is pitched. Fermentation begins soon after, and typically lasts from four to six days.
When the initial fermentation has subsided, the beer is racked into Brite tanks, where final conditioning, settling and carbonation take place, usually in a time span of two weeks.
The finished beer is then pumped to the serving tanks or kegged, tapped, poured, and enjoyed by the consumer.


Stockyards Bank & Trust Co started in 1904.


York (c. 1770-March 1831?) was an American slave best known for his service with the Lewis and Clark Expedition and subsequent demands for freedom.
York, his father (also known as York), his mother Rose and younger sister and brother Nancy and Juba, were slaves of the Clark family. York was born in Caroline County near Ladysmith, Virginia. He was William Clark's servant from boyhood, and was left to William in his father's will. He had a wife, and possibly, a family before the Lewis and Clark Expedition.
In 1804, York was compelled to leave his family and accompany Clark and 40 others on the Lewis and Clark Expedition. The expedition's journals present York as a large, strong man who shared the duties and risks of the expedition in full.[4] He was the only African American member of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, and in the wilderness served as an equal member, with freedoms and responsibilities unlike back East. The assignments given him, as recorded in the journals, attest to his skill in scouting, hunting and field medicine. When the expedition reached the Pacific Ocean, York voted along with the rest as to where the Expedition would build winter quarters. Most significantly, at a time in which slaves were forbidden to carry weapons, York not only carried a firearm but also frequently shot game such as buffalo.
Historian Robert B. Betts speculates that the freedom York had during the Lewis and Clark expedition made resuming enslavement unbearable.[5] After the expedition returned to the United States, every other member received money and land for their services. York received nothing, since as a slave he was considered mere property. York apparently asked Clark for his freedom based upon his good services during the expedition. Failing that, York pleaded to be reunited with his wife, who was owned by a man in Louisville; he even offered to work in Louisville and send Clark all his earnings. Clark refused, pleaded financial difficulties, although he let York send a couple of buffalo robes to his wife and, a couple of years later, visit her for a few weeks.
Clark's attitude is recorded in letters to his brother. When York returned from his visit to his wife, Clark considered him still "insolent and sulky" and disciplined him with beatings. He considered selling York in New Orleans, or hiring him out to a "severe master". York continued demanding freedom, Clark hired him out to others.
York's eventual fate is not clear. One story is that Clark set him free sometime after 1810 and set him up in business hauling freight; another is that York was indeed a drayer but still a slave. Washington Irving has written that Clark told him in 1832 that York failed in business because he didn't like the responsibilities of being free, and had died of cholera while trying to rejoin Clark in St. Louis. Betts hints that this story is implausible and more likely reflects Clark's belief that slaves were happier under the firm hand of a master.
Historian Áhati N. N. Touré suggests another possibility: that York simply refused to return to Clark, and escaped to freedom. Betts cites a witness who met with an African man living among the Crows in north-central Wyoming, who boasted in 1834 of having escaped from slavery after participating in the Lewis and Clark Expedition.
Louisville Slugger Field is a baseball stadium in Louisville, Kentucky and is home to the Louisville Bats, the AAA affiliate of the Cincinnati Reds. It opened in 2000 and with seats for over 13,000 fans.


The Louisville Metro Hall, formerly the Jefferson County Courthouse or Louisville Courthouse, is the center of Louisville, Kentucky's government. The building was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1972. Construction began in 1837, and both the City of Louisville and Jefferson County governments starting using it in 1842.
Slave-trading was held by the courthouse in the 1840s. Ironically, so were speeches calling for the abolition of slavery.
When the courthouse was originally built, it was hoped that it would be the Statehouse for Kentucky. This hope was the goal of James Guthrie, but due to the capital staying in Frankfort, it became known as "Guthrie's folly". It did see some state government use during the American Civil War, when it briefly housed the Kentucky State Legislature when Frankfort was acquired by Confederate forces.
After a fire in 1905, the building was renovated by Brinton Davis.
When he visited Louisville in 1948, Frank Lloyd Wright referred specifically to the Courthouse when he said, "Louisville's architecture represents the quality of the old South; we should not build this type of building anymore but we should keep those we have left." This was after efforts in the 1940s to demolish it for urban renewal.
The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1972.
Improvements to the building includes placing a statue of Henry Clay, designed by Joel T. Hart, on the main floors, and extensive renovations in the 1980s.
The Jefferson County Courthouse Annex at 517 Court Pl. was listed on the National Register in 1980.
Since the merger of the former City of Louisville with Jefferson County, the building was renamed Louisville Metro Hall and now primarily houses the offices of the Mayor of Louisville Metro. In addition, the offices of the Jefferson County Clerk, the Kentucky Court of Appeals and the Kentucky Supreme Court Justice for the Louisville district are located in this building.
There are two prominently-sited statues outside the Courthouse. In front of the building is a statue of Thomas Jefferson by Moses Ezekiel, given to the city in 1901. The second, on the corner of Sixth and Jefferson, across from the Louisville City Hall, is a statue of King Louis XVI, that was presented as a gift to Louisville from Louisville's sister city, Montpellier, France, on July 17, 1967. At the presentation, a crowd of 300 dignitaries, both French and American, saw Montpellier's Mayor Francois Delmas officially present it to Louisville Mayor Kenneth Schmied. It was sculpted in 1829 by Achille-Joseph Valois for the king's surviving daughter, Marie-Therese, Queen Dowager of France, and made its public debut in Montpellier. However, the Second French Revolution soon took place, endangering the statue. It was then placed at a military base to protect it, and then was placed in Montpellier University, and then finally in the municipal archives' storage basement. In 1899 the statue was found to have an arm damaged, and to be in disrepair. It stayed in storage until it was decided in 1966 to give the statue to Louisville, making a seven-month journey between Montpellier and Louisville. The Carrara marble statue weighs nine tons, and is 12 feet high.

Well that was about it for our whirlwind tour of Louisville and it was a great day as we did a lot and saw tons. We drove back to the RV and by the time Mom did our logs it was time for dinner and to call it a day. So until next time we Love and miss you all. Mom & Dad