Louisville day 2

6/30

Louisville Day 2

We woke up today to a little rain, which is actually pretty loud in the RV.  It was also the most humid day I've experienced since we left Denver.  This humidity is what I remember the midwest being like.  It is absolutely horrible and suffocating.  At 8:30 am it was probably in the mid 60's, and so humid the air conditioning in the RV was on full blast, and it still made us hot.  We were all pretty slow to get up.  I got picked up by an Enterprise rental car guy to get the minivan for today and tomorrow's excusrions.  I rode with him back to the Enterprise facility to sign all the paperwork.  Once I left it, was approaching 10 am quickly, so I went by Denny's on the way back to the campground.  I called in the order before I got there to save us 5-10 minutes which proved to be smart.  The farther South we go the slower people seem to move.  I walked into Denny's and was amazed to see a diner blow out a huge puff of smoke. I actually did a double take, as I could not believe what I was seeing.  I was amazed that you can still smoke in restaurants, and I assume bars, in KY.  

I took all of our food back to the campground and the kids, Tracy, and Aunt Colleen were all ready at the picnic table.  Everyone was starving and ate accordingly.  By now I know what each kid and adult likes to eat so it was simple to satisfy everyone.  After scarfing down our food, I showered and the moms got the kids packed up in our rental minivan.  We departed for the Louisville Slugger Museum.  

The Louisville Slugger museum is in downtown Louisville, a block or two off the Ohio River.  It's hard to imagine, but I assume many years ago the Ohio River was a major trade route.  We parked in a pay lot where you have to stuff the $5.00 into a little hole that is numbered the same as the space you parked in.  When we walked up to the pay station, there were two girls standing there staring at the pay station.  They asked us if we could help them, and clearly had an accent.  l showed them how to jam the money into the little slot and they laughed and said thank you.  They said they were from the Netherlands, and I laughed in my head, because I'm sure in the Netherlands everything is computerized and newer.  Most americans would probably be as dumbfounded as they were in the Netherlands trying to park in a pay lot.  

Louisville Slugger bats have been made for over 100 years in this area.  It was a very interesting tour and the kids, especially Davis, who has the attention span of his father, stayed interested.  Davis was super interested in every stop of the 30 minute tour. He ran to the front and followed the guide closely, which I have never seen him do.  At the end of the tour, everyone got mini Louisville Slugger bat as a free gift for attending the tour.  We went into the batting cages and all of us hit... or attempted to hit balls.  Austin, my soon to be 13 year old nephew, hit in the fast pitch baseball machine, like myself, and did well.  He actually broke Buster Posey's bat which he was very proud of (and amazed his cousin Davis).  The girls, Davis, and Caden went in the slow pitch softball batting cage and did well.  Before we started the tour I ordered a handful of personalized bats, which we picked up at the gift shop at the end of our time there.  

We took the bats back to the car and walked around looking for a lunch spot.  We tried to find a place on the river, but there was nothing down on the river front.  We settled on a sandwich shop that was average, but air conditioned.  I had been wanting to go to the Muhammad Ali museum, but didn't think the kids had the energy.  I told the moms I was going to run over there and check it out for a half hour while they finished up lunch.  I walked over there to find out it is closed on Mondays, and came back a few minutes later to chuckles from the moms. 

We learned not to pack too many activities into one day at Mt. Rushmore, so we packed up the kids and went back to the campground.  Tracy took the rental car to the grocery store to purchase food for dinner and breakfast tomorrow morning.  The kids rode banana bikes, jumped on the trampoline, and eventually Aunt Colleen and I took them swimming.  

We swam for a few hours.  The highlight for me was when the kids started having races from one side of the pool to the other.  Aunt Colleen and I joined in, and I was quickly crowned the best swimmer of the adults.  Before our race Davis asked if he could bring his lacrosse ball into the pool and throw it around with Arden.  I said ok but directed him to be very careful.  A lacrosse ball is rubber but is a little softer than a baseball, so getting hit with it definitely hurts.  Davis and Arden played fine for a few minutes, and then BAM, Davis threw it across the pool and it hit a man in the side of the head.  This had to hurt.  I immediately made him apologize and sit out.  I also apologized to the man.  After making Davis sat there for 20 minutes or so I called Davis over and instructed him to walk over to the man, look him in the eyes and say "sir, I'm sorry I hit you with that ball, are you okay"?  Davis did just as I told him and the man said "apology accepted young man, don't worry about  it".  Davis was shy after that and didn't want to go right back into the pool.  I was bummed he made such a stupid mistake, but proud I made him do the right thing and apologize like a man.  Hopefully he'll learn that lesson for next time.  

After swimming with the kids for a few hours I went back to the RV and helped Tracy prepare dinner.  It was really nice to hang out and talk to each other alone.  We realized we'd been so busy the last few weeks we really hadn't spent much alone time together.  We were excited to prepare dinner and hang out together.  We had steak, chicken, potatoes, salad, garlic bread and watermelon.  The little cabin we rented next to the RV for my sister and her boys has a propane grill, so it was easy to cook.  The kids came back right as the food was finishing up, and were starving.  We all ate in the RV tonight because it was so hot out.  After we ate and cleaned up, we headed outside to make a campfire and some s'mores.  

We went to the KOA store to buy some wood for the fire, and they said they'd deliver it in a few minutes.  We made our kindling and paper bundle and waited for our wood.  Once the wood arrived we lit the kindling and paper.  If you read my posts from Rushmore you'll recall I am horrible at making a fire.  I realized IT'S NOT ME!  It's the wood from the KOA.  We had a roaring paper and kindling bundle, and I put a few pieces of wood on it and it wouldn't start on fire.  I broke down and got the lighter fluid out, and still, the wood wouldn't start on fire.  Half a bottle of lighter fluid later we had the fire going.  I was glad to realize the fire wood the KOAs sell is the problem not me!  That's my story and I'm sticking to it.  We made some s'mores and played with sparklers.  It was so hot and humid, we were all sweating, and the chocolate was so melted it was dripping down the kids faces in the form of chocolate beards. We decided to go back into the pool for a little while and swim to cool off (and have a pre-rinse before shower time).  I can't imagine working outside in this weather.  It's 90 degrees and 90% humidity.  As I write this it's 9:30 pm and still 83 degrees out.  It's a big change for us coming from Colorado where it will be 90 degrees during the day and 55 degrees at night.  All with no humidity.  I'm starting to get concerned about the weather as I realize we're heading further South for the next few weeks.  

After showers, we put the kids to bed, and are now sitting here checking back in with society, our phones, emails, etc.  We are heading to Nashville tomorrow, and still need to figure out the plan for when to leave Louisville, and how many days to stay in Nashville.  

We are about halfway done with our trip at this point.  We've seen and done so much, I can't imagine 21 more days of this.  I'm having a great time with the family, and so far no one seems to miss home too much.  We are all very thankful I'm able to take this trip, and have made this RV our "home on wheels."

Favorite parts of the day:

Austin - breaking Buster Posey's bat in the batting cage

Aunt Colleen - watching her boys teach Davis how to dive into the pool

Tracy - asked another lady at the pool who was tanner, her or Colleen and the woman said Tracy was (every year Tracy and Colleen have a "who's tanner competition" in GA.  (Tracy later confessed that this was not true and never happened, she just wanted to mess with Colleen).

Davis - jumping on the trampoline when it was wet and sliding off of it

Me - eating a dinner we made in the RV, with all of my family and my sister, and her family. 

Arden- getting a personalized bat with her name on it and getting Super Uncle Steve (my brother who tells the kids to call him Super Uncle Steve since birth) a bat because he's nice and always takes us boating 

Caden - riding banana bikes and going to the museum 

Lightning bugs