Kentucky Spring Break Trip - Day 4 (Lincoln's Boyhood Home & Mammoth Cave)

While planning this trip, we wanted to do a few other things in the area. We had extra days and wanted to add to the Ark and the Creation Museum stops. We looked on the map and discussed going a bit further south to Mammoth Cave. This is a park that has been on Matt & my "list" for a quite a few years. We then noticed that the birthplace of Abraham Lincoln was "on the way" to Mammoth Cave. Adding those 2 stops to our trip added an extra day - now we just wanted to figure out which way to head - Cincinnati for our first night or do everything in reverse and stay in Cincinnati for our last night. 

Ultimately, we decided to head to Cincinnati first. As we discussed our options, we realized that by going east first, the time zone changes would work in our favor. On Day 4, we would start in the Eastern time zone, visit Lincoln's birthplace home (in Eastern), switch to Central time on our way to Mammoth Cave and then switch back to Eastern time as we head to our hotel for the night. While we were often confused as to what time it *actually* was (not all of our devices switched every time), it worked in our favor!

We packed up the hotel room and hit the road to Hodgenville, KY - Lincoln's Birthplace. 

We really enjoyed reading about Lincoln's time in Kentucky as we toured the visitor's center and watched the video.

We left the visitor center and walked along the boardwalk to the building that housed the log cabin. (Lincoln Birthplace Memorial).

We found all the symbolism fascinating. 56 steps leading up to the building representing the 56 years Abraham Lincoln lived before being assassinated. Inside there were 16 post that held the chain around the log cabin, and 16 rosettes on the ceiling - of course representative of him being our 16th President. The corner stone was laid in 1909, marking the 100th anniversary of his birth. 

There were more, that's just to give you a taste.

More selfies with Matt looking into the sun, haha!

We stopped to see the Sinking Spring, this spring is one of the reasons that Lincoln's father chose this land to settle with his family.

We ended our time by walking around the Boundary Oak Trail. 

We grabbed water & snacks and then hit the road for the 45 minute drive to Mammoth Cave. While planning the trip, I came across a website that listed the top 10 things to do at Mammoth Cave National Park. We hoped to cross off about half of these items while we visited for the afternoon.

Dinosaur World was a fun photo op stop near the park.

Our first stop was a quick hike around Sloan's Crossing Pond. We saw this snake at the first overlook - making some of us a bit tentative about the rest of the walk.

We headed to the visitor center to make a picnic lunch and check in for the cave tour that we had registered for. 

Matt's Great-Grandparents William Lee and Mary Addie (Thomas) Easter are pictured below (middle row; 2nd and 3rd from the right) before their tour through Mammoth Cave.

William and Mary were both from Glasgow, Barren County, Kentucky and got married in Bowling Green on January 23, 1924. They went to Mammoth Cave on their honeymoon.

I love the historic nature of the photo above, from the old lanterns being held (how many can you count?) to all the woman (and a few of the men) wearing head scarves to keep the bats out of their hair.

A few of us were apprehensive about heading into the cave (namely me & Maddie). We are both claustrophobic and weren't necessarily looking forward to the tour. We wanted to give it a try though.  We signed up for the Historic Tour, which is a 2 hour tour through a portion of the cave system (and we assume the same tour that Matt's Great Grandparents went on). We joined 100 of our closest friends and headed into the cave. 

As we traveled through the cave, we came to an area where we had to duck, bend and twist. It ended up being a fun part of the tour!

We left the cave and started heading up the hill, back towards the visitor center. We were surprised by the warmth and humidity once we were outside of the cave (which had been about 55 degrees) and quickly took off our sweatshirts and jackets!

As we were walking up the hill, we saw a sign for the "Old Guide's Cemetery" and detoured to see it. That was another item on our check list.

We hiked back to the van and headed to the Green River Ferry (within the park). This would be our last "checklist" item. 

We really enjoyed our time at Mammoth Cave National Park - even if only there for an afternoon. The park had some great trails, the ferry was a fun experience and the cave ended up being an amazing experience!

We left Cave City and started towards our hotel in Terre Haute, IN. It was a 4 hour drive and we lost an hour since we bumped back to the Eastern Time Zone. With a longer dinner stop at Texas Roadhouse and a lot of rain, we were beyond ready to crash when we arrived at our hotel for the night. 

Another day is "in the books" - a little bit of history and a lot of exploring. It was a great day!