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Published: June 11th 2008
Louisville Slugger Museum
Wow! It's Paul Bunyon's bat!We left our lovely campsite at around 10AM and headed to Louisville to go to the Louisville Slugger Factory and Museum. Thus began our journey to try and find a place to park the RV. We were told that there would be parking for the RV at the factory, but no such luck. I ended up dropping off Carrie and Sam to run in and ask where we might be able to park. They found a place down the block, the opposite way I was going. So after making a loop around all the one-way streets, I managed to get to the parking lot and Carrie talked them into letting us park across a few spots. Luckily, they were the worst spots in the lot and no one would want to park in the water and mud filled spots anyway. Ironically, our parking spot had a better view than the campground we stayed at last night. The parking lot was right on the Ohio River. After parking, we headed through the hellish heat to the factory. Outside it, there is a bat about 120 feet tall. Once inside the cool comfort of the museum, we looked at some of the historic
Louisville Slugger
A huge bat outside the museum. bats. There is even a Babe Ruth bat that was used to hit 21 home runs before cracking. Each time Babe hit a home run, he put a notch around the famous Louisville logo. The bat is insured for a million dollars. During the tour of the factory, we were not allowed to take any pictures. We got to see how the bats are made, both for recreational and professional use. The recreational bats take about 30 seconds on a lathe to make. Once formed, they are sanded, extra knobs of wood are removed from each end (we got to take one as a souvenir), the logo is branded on (Only the ash bats are branded. The maple bats have a logo sticker placed on them), and then stained and finish applied. The professional bats are made on a one-of-a-kind computer controlled (CNC) lathe. The bats are made to the player’s specifications, but only if they have a contract. Other players can choose from a wide selection they already have set. If the player has a contract, they get their signature branded on the bat. All other players get their name branded on in block letters. After the tour, we
Louisville Slugger
Jason and the huge bat. toured the exhibit of baseballs signed by presidents. It contained baseballs signed by every president starting with Teddy Roosevelt.
We then had lunch at the Old Spaghetti Factory. The food was good, but the service was horrible. Oh well, on to better things.
Our next stop, which was not planned, was a tour of Diamond Caves. We happened to be passing it on the way to Mammoth National Park and Carrie remembered our chiropractor mentioning it to her. Diamond Caves got its name from the slave boy who discovered it. When he found it, he told his master and he, along with a few other “brave” men lowered the boy into the cave with a candle. The boy said he saw what looked like diamonds. When he heard this, the master then had himself lowered in. There were no diamonds, but he used the name to lure tourists in. Diamond Caves is a living, or wet, cave. It means that water is still dripping through it and, very slowly, creating new formations. The guide said that if you get hit by a water drip, it gives you 7 years of good luck. If that’s true, we all should
Mirror
We all know Sammie loves mirrors. have about 100 years of good luck each! We, meaning Jason, took a ton of pictures. Our tour guide, Greg, was a nice young man that Sam found to be “cute.” He was a very funny tour guide and Sam really wanted his phone number!
After leaving Diamond Caves, we attempted to find Mammoth Cave National Park Campground. After a few minutes, we stopped for directions and found our way easily to our campsite. We then biked about a mile to where our tour started. Our tour guide, William the Boring, took us on a two and half hour lantern tour of Mammoth Cave. The whole tour was supposed to be by lantern but the lights on part of the tour would not turn off. Mammoth Cave is a dry cave and the part we were in had no beautiful formations. The highlight of the tour was the Star Chamber. Once your eyes adjusted to the lights, you could see what looked like stars in the black ceiling. Black on the ceiling of the cave was caused by smoke sticking to the white gypsum in the ceiling. Throughout the years, pieces had flaked off, along with people throwing stones
Diamond Cave
Entrance into the cave. at the ceiling to create new “stars.”
After the tour, we returned to our sweatbox RV and discovered the fridge was not working. After a call to the RV Doctor, we found out a work around to try and get the fridge working which will try at our next campsite.
We ended the day at 10PM central to try and get some sleep in the heat. We only had to drive about 105 miles.
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