While in Cadiz, we took a few days to explore Louisville.  We were there over the 4th of July so I’m sure we didn’t see the “real” Louisville — the city was very, very quiet.  But, even taking that into account, Louisville left us feeling a little blah about the city.  (Are you getting the sense that maybe we just don’t really like the South?????  We are starting to get that feeling, with the notable exceptions of New Orleans and Key West.  But never fear, happier posts are coming soon.)

We enjoyed our distillery tours, but we’ve been on more interesting tours.  We started at Evan Williams and I thought it was a bit too cheesy, what with the videos and sound effects telling the story of how the distillery was founded.  But, Robert did get to try some moonshine there, and we both got to try a delicious bourbon ball during the tasting portion.  (And, I somehow managed not to yell at the kids — yes, kids — on the tour with us).  We also hit Peerless.  While it was interesting to hear from the owner, he sure could spin some tall tales.  And, we were sweating buckets for a large portion of the tour.  But, once again there was chocolate during the tasting portion, which made the sweating part worthwhile.  And, we learned that the Palmer House Hilton in Chicago invented brownies.  Who knew????

Aging barrels at Peerless.

We really enjoyed our one museum visit.  We visited the Frazier Museum, which is a history museum.  We aren’t typically museum people, but the Frazier had a very interesting display about bourbon (including a collection of the $1000 — no, that is not a typo — mint julep cups sold every year at the Derby) and a Lewis & Clark exhibit that taught me several new things about the expedition.  We actually ended up spending much of an afternoon at the Frazier — pretty much unheard of for us.

Bottles and bottles of bourbon.

While there wasn’t a ton of street art in Louisville, we did enjoy the few pieces we saw, especially the painted horses scattered around town.

Painted horse in Louisville.

And, we enjoyed our hotel.  Just like in Nashville, we stayed at a 21C Museum Hotel.  This one had a huge statue of David outside.  The art was not as edgy as in Nashville, but the bartenders were just as friendly and we woke up one morning to big pink penguins guarding our door.

21C Museum Hotel.

And, we enjoyed having some stupid, cheesy, corny, fun.  I don’t even know who this guy is, but you can rest assured we had to take photos as soon as we saw it.

Lisa in Louisville.

I know what you are thinking about this point.  You are thinking “what about the food?  they always talk about the food.”  Well, we didn’t love the food in Louisville.  One of our meals was outrageously bad (cough, cough, Bar Vetti I’m looking at you).  Most were average at best.  Doc Crow’s stood out as one of the few places we would highly recommend. Although we only had appetizers, we stopped in on two nights and enjoyed sitting at the bar.  We also enjoyed sitting at the bar at Mussel and Burger Bar and downing some mussels and frites.

Bottom line, we are glad we checked out a new city, but I doubt we will be back (unless, of course, I can convince Robert to come to the Derby some year).