I also marked off Kentucky and Indiana on my State Capitol Buildings quest. Of course, both rotundas are currently under construction. 🏷️ 25.05C
Larry Bird, the pride of French Lick, Indiana. 🏷️ 25.05C

Toured the Benjamin Harrison Presidential Site today, which brings me to within two of completing my “A Site For Each President” quest—just Madison and Nixon left. I’ll do Nixon in Aug, but no immediate plans for Montpelier (they closed early on a previous trip I made to the site 🙄). 🏷️ 25.05C
Had an enjoyable evening at Mirror Twin Brewing in Lexington KY a few nights ago. Also made a stop at Afterburner in Terre Haute IN last night. And Kismetic in Indianapolis IN today. #LostNeededDirections 🏷️ 25.05C
So, this was an unexpected voicemail to receive. It was apparently an email(?) read aloud to my voicemail by a T-Mobile operator, asking me about a random blog post about the only way way to drive directly from Missouri to Kentucky, an artifact of one of my (weird) “state border crossings” quest.

I sidetracked a bit to visit Berea College, the first racially integrated and coeducational school in the South.
Funny enough, this cool memorial scene was funded by the guy who opened the very first KFC franchise, in Salt Lake City of all places. And, yes, I have already been there 😂. 🏷️ 25.05C
Grabbed a sandwich on my way to Flat Lick Falls so I could use it as a nice lunch spot.
Unfortunately(?), I enjoyed this quaint little falls enough that I totally forgot about my sandwich and drove an hour to the next town and got an entirely different lunch. 🤦♂️ 🏷️ 25.05C

While I followed along much of the Hatfield-McCoy feud trail, the only spot I spent more than a brief moment pausing to read a plaque was visiting the oddly-placed on the side of a steep hill Hatfield Family cemetery, which features the grave of the Hatfield ringleader, “Devil Anse.” 🏷️ 25.05C
I also visited the historic African Zion Baptist Church, one of the first churches started by slaves. It was the home church of Booker T Washington. 🏷️ 25.05C
I’ll need actual wifi to upload the video, but I made it out to Black Mountain, the high point of Kentucky.
It was the last one to complete for my “lazy highpointers” quest of (nearly) drivable state summits. One of my oldest quests, originally called High Points of Otherwise Flat States. 🏷️25.05C

Made a new, but short-lived, friend. He just seemed far more interested in my picnic basket than my friendship. 🏷️ 25.05C
Haha, whoops! 🙈🤷♂️😜 I’m now in Virginia (and no, I didn’t get a map for that this morning at AAA). 🏷️ 25.05C
When in coal country…build things out of coal?
I sure hope they have a no smoking policy! 🏷️ 25.05C
I’m beginning to wonder if this might be a dangerous neighborhood. 🏷️ 25.05C

Feeling oddly vindicated:
I changed into a dirty shirt upon arriving at lunch today. Because I know myself well enough to understand that I was unlikely to make it thru this red pasta sauce dish and the side salad with oil vinaigrette dressing without an “incident.” And, sure enough… 🏷️25.05C
It looks like my road trip has brought me to Kentucky, a state I hadn’t planned on visiting 😂🤷♂️. So I had to plan my morning around getting to a AAA office to pick up a map. 🏷️ 25.05C

The birthplace of Mother’s Day. 🏷️ 25.05C
I also visited the Fairfax Stone. This monument replaced the original 1736 boundary marker (placed by George Washington!), which delineated the 1649 boundary between the Virginia and Maryland land grants. It marks the “source” of the Potomac River (see the water flowing to the top left). 🏷️25.05C
Blackwater Falls was cooler than I expected, probably helped by all the rain and flooding I’ve encountered on this trip. Glad I finally made it out here. 🏷️ 25.05C
Angry dirty dishwater 😜