The Adventures of Annie and Mitch: Following the Whiskey Trail

We left Indiana and started our journey south: through Kentucky. Neither of us had been to Kentucky before. Turns out it's really pretty! And also really humid. We definitely hit the south.

Our actual destination was Nashville but Kentucky is between Indiana and Nashville for those of you who aren't up on your southern geography. Kentucky is also the home of bourbon, which means they have a ton of distilleries in the state. Something in the 30 range- that's a lot of booze. And while stopping at all of them sounds great, we opted for just one this trip: Makers Mark.

Our criteria for deciding which distillery to stop at were pretty complex: do they do a tour? How close to "on the way" is it? Makers Mark does tours and is relatively close to the freeway, so it was the winner. And it turned out to be an excellent choice and one I recommend the next time you find yourself traversing Kentucky and in search of bourbon.

To get there we took a lot of windy back roads through the hilly countryside, hoping we were on the right path. And then we saw it: a huge house and what was clearly the distillery. It is a gorgeous estate: a lovely babbling brook, trees, fields, various buildings all used on the production and bottling. They do everything on site: make the mash, ferment it, distill it, age it in whiskey barrels, bottle it, label it, and hand dip it in their signature red wax. We took a tour, got to taste the fermenting mash (which was actually cold even though it looks like it is boiling- the bubbles are the yeast eating sugars), saw the barrels being aged, saw the bottling line, and learned the history. Most of the credit really belongs to Margie Samuels, the founders wife. She came up with the brand name because the Samuels family had made moonshine that was awful and their name was not terribly well regarded when it came to taste. She also created the brand and did a lot of the early marketing. I love learning about awesome women in history!

The company is still run by a descendant, the grandson of Margie. At the end of the tour we got to do a tasting (woo hoo!). It was about noon and we hadn't really eaten yet, so even though it was a small amount of whiskey, we felt it. We got to try their "white dog" or moonshine- unaged whiskey. We also tried the classic, Bill Jr's (the recently retired CEO and founders son) creation- 46, and a private label election they've just started. Then they bring you into the giftshop where you can purchase your own bottles and hand dip them into the red wax. Obviously we were all about that- so we got a few bottles and dipped them. The pros can do up to 28 bottle dips per minute. We need more practice. We also became Ambassadors. Which means we signed up to get our names put on a gold plaque that will then be placed on a barrel. In 7 years our barrel will be ready for bottling and we get to go back to Kentucky and buy some of the bottles from our barrel. Sneaky marketing at its finest. But we are already planning our trip back for our barrel baby's graduation. You also get to wear a neat name tag and be recognized by the tour guides and all the staff. So that's a fun perk.

After we dipped our bottles we continued south- to Mammoth Cave National Park. The drive was again quite a few windy back roads. And then signs declaring "road ends in water". I've never seen a sign declaring this and there wasn't any other way to go, so we kept driving. And saw more signs warning of what seemed like our impending doom. And then, all of a sudden, water. The road literally just goes into a small river. But there is a ferry! We waited in line (part because ferrys are cool and part because there was no other option- road ended in water after all) and then got to drive onto the ferry with the two cars in front of us. The ferry is attached to cables and is a very short ride to cross the river. But it was the first time either of us had ever been on a ferry with our vehicle, let alone while sitting in our vehicle. Certainly an unexpected means of transportation in our quest to the park. We also crossed back into the central time zone somewhere along the windy roads, which was lucky for us because the ferry took a bit longer than I anticipated and we would have missed our tour had we not gained an hour. So thanks arbitrary time zone lines!

And now the main event: Mammoth Cave. It is the longest series of connected caves in the world and currently sits at about 400 miles, but is continually being mapped and explored. Most of the 400 miles are only crawlable. But a few miles are walkable so we took a tour of two miles of it. We went through giant rooms, very narrow passages aptly named "fat mans misery" and "tall mans misery". Though if you ask me, tall men would be miserable during a solid 75% of the tour. The more places we go the more I'm grateful for both of our short statures. We are very rarely "too tall" for anything and didn't have to do too much ducking in the caves. Thanks genetics!

We also saw a beautiful and incredibly tall dome, lots of scalloped rock formed by the running water that creates the limestone caves, 1800s candle graffiti made by holding the flame of a candle made of animal fat close to the roof of the cave and creating a black mark. We also learned a good amount of history: the earliest tour guides and cave explorers and miners of Mammoth were slaves. They were so good at their jobs that more slaves were often rented out to explore further and currently a descendant of one of the early slave explorers still works at the park. There is also evidence of human presence in the caves 5000 years ago. It was amazing how one cave system has had such an impact and been shaped by so many people through history. From what it sounded like the slaves who explored the cave worked alone and explored further based primarily on their own curiosity and desire to see what lie ahead in the darkness. It was a worthwhile stop and tour, and the cave was a lovely 54 degrees which was a nice reprieve from the heat and stifling humidity above.

Next stop: Nashville and another new state!