2. 4/3
We left Sunday morning from Stonewall Jackson State Park in WV on a foggy morning but with the sun coming out as we drove south about 100 miles on 79 to the capitol of WV, Charleston. Beautiful drive up and down hills like going through Franconia Notch in NH but that is only two miles and this drive is over 300. Stopped in Charleston at the capitol complex and walked around. This is a wonderful complex and it is huge. On weekends visitors can park free and visit or walk around this landscaped complex with dogwoods, tulips, many other flowers including cherry trees in full bloom. The State Capitol with its Vermont Marble and gold dome, the governor’s mansion, archives, state museum, cultural complex and other buildings are all on these grounds. The river runs by it with sidewalks for running and walking and there are a number of memorials to those who have died serving our country from WW1 to the present time. If you ever come by here it is definitely worth a stop – tours are given most days and most buildings are open but not on Sunday morning. George said he has a different view of WV after seeing this – it is the most outstanding and beautiful capitol complex in the USA. The architect who designed it, Cass Gilbert, also did the MN and Arkansas capitols, the first world’s skyscraper the Woolworth Building, U.S. Treasury Building and the Supreme Court Building in DC.
Left there and headed west on 64 with a stop in Milton, WV to visit the museum of the Blenko Glass Works. Small but interesting and they have designed the stain glass windows for St. Patrick’s Cathedral in NYC. They also have designed the Country Music Awards and many sports trophies. The gift shop shows their dinnerware, vases and everything else they make. The glass ornaments for $50 are something to see. Good stop!
Headed west from here through Huntington, WV where Marshall University is and
arrived at Grayson Lake State Park Resort in Grayson, KY around 3 in the afternoon where we spent the night. George is so mad he did not bring his golf clubs because they have an award winning golf course right next to the campground actually the first sites must find a number of golf balls coming right at them especially if Brad and George were playing. Kentucky has a number of State Parks with golf courses and they are very reasonable. State Park is nice with swimming, hiking, golf, swimming, boating, volleyball, basketball, hiking, horseshoe pits and picnic areas. We spent the rest of the day exploring this park. The best thing about this park was that after having hail and below freezing temperatures for the last two days – today was sunny and close to 80.

4/4 – Left Grayson Lake State Park Resort around 8:30 am to head west again on 64.
Only had about 50 miles to travel today before we got off the interstate. We were headed for Natural Bridge State Resort Park, KY near the Red River Gorge. Well, our GPS took us off the highway down these backroads to Stanton, KY and did we see KY. The old KY with narrow roads and most homes right on the road either mobile homes or small houses with porches. Saw a lot of men sitting and talking and waving as we went by. This is a slower pace of living. Once we got to Stanton we headed toward the Natural Bridge Area and it was very confusing at first to find the campground we were going to since there are a couple of them. Again this area reminds of Franconia Notch area in NH. We were assigned a great site backed up to the mountain with the river out our back door. There were little bridges to cross over to get to the restrooms and the ranger station. Since there was a storm coming we changed sites to get on the other side of the river for safety reasons. This storm is coming in late this afternoon with heavy rain and wind and there are some tunnel clouds reported touching the ground. Just what I feared – the weather in KY has been terrible this year.
We did take a drive around the byway to the Red River Gorge Area and Daniel Boone National Forest but we were lucky there wasn’t any other traffic. Roads are not meant for RV’s over 25 and there are a lot of curves but with pullouts for hiking, sights and National Forest campsites. Came back to the campground in the afternoon to wait out the storm. so if you don’t hear from us again this is where the tornado took us off to never, never land.
4/5 Well, we were lucky last night one storm went to the north of us and the other storm came through but the worse part of the storm with hail and tornadoes just missed us to the south. We left and headed south towards Berea where Berea College is. What a beautiful campus and none of these students pay tuition – they have to work for their tuition. This college has a huge endowment so that 80% of their 1,500 students come from Appalachia country and are low income with rest from all over the world. They work on the farm and with all the artists that live in Berea. The college gives tours and the small town has a really cute downtown with shops, inns and restaurants. There are tours around the town of all the artist studios are. Berea has arts and crafts of all sorts – paintings, glassware, jewelry, pottery etc. The Kentucky Artisan Center at Berea was built by the state for visitors to explore Kentucky artisan works and their stories, crafts from all the state, music and there is a cute little restaurant there showcasing foods from Kentucky. We really enjoyed our visit to this town and the Artisan Center. The workers there gave us so much information about visiting this area and the history of the college.
Left this area and headed back towards Lexington when we stopped in Richmond to visit the visitor center of the Richmond Battlefield. Found some parts of it but they do not open until May so could not get into the center but we could tour the battlefield which is what we did. Headed for Fort Boonesborough State Park where we were staying for the night. Set up camp and ate a quick lunch then hiked through the woods up a hill to Fort Boonesborough where Daniel Boone established the second settlement in Kentucky. This is a reconstructed site built up higher away from the Kentucky River. Interesting and we really enjoyed visiting the fort and reading the history about Daniel Boone. Everything around here has to do with Daniel Boone. He and his wife actually died in Missouri and were buried at one of his son’s homes but the state of Kentucky requested that they be brought back to the state to be buried in this area where he lived and had such an influence on this state. Today was partly sunny but a little cooler again but it wasn’t raining.