Bowling Green

We went to Bowling Green for one reason only, but discovered another unexpected gem. It turns out that the only GM manufacturing plant for Corvettes is in Bowling Green. While we could not catch a tour of the plant due to our timing, we did manage to cruise by and see the plant. Wish we could have managed a tour – maybe next time.

However, across the highway is the National Corvette Museum. We all have heard about this museum in the news in the last year. We all heard about the sink hole that suddenly opened up under a museum and consumed a bunch of priceless vintage Corvettes. Well, that was this museum! I assumed that what I heard about on the news was some kind of GM historical holding tank for Corvettes, but it turns out there is a nonprofit organization in Bowling Green that runs a Corvette museum because of the plant being located here.

We toured the museum and had a great time. Corvettes of all eras crowded the display floors, including a few of the initial year of this timeless roadster – 1953. Because of the location of the only manufacturing facility in the world, the Corvette is the official sports car of the Commonwealth of Kentucky.

The museum shows the location of the sinkhole – now fully repaired and reinforced – with masking tape on the floor of the display area where it happened. The vehicles that were lost in the calamity are also on display so that visitors to the museum have a bit of historical insight into the problem.

While there, we learned that folk ordering new 2016 Corvettes could take possession, should they choose, at the National Corvette Museum. If they chose, they would be subjected to some of the pomp associated with the mystique of the brand – and maybe get a few cool pics as well.

The other reason for Bowling Green was Mammoth Cave National Park. We have seen lots of caves in our travels, but Mammoth Cave claims to be the longest mapped cave system in the world. While constantly changing (i.e. growing) Mammoth Cave system is mapped at 405 miles!

At Mammoth Cave, there are only guided tours – no self-guided like we did in Carlsbad Caverns. Because I knew we could fit it in, I booked us for an evening tour and a morning the next day, figuring we could make them both work with a one night stay. That worked out great!

The evening tour was great. It left before sunset but ended after. The gist of the tour was the cave as the early explorers saw it. The electric lights in the cave were off. We had oil lanterns – not fake electric lanterns, actual burning oil lanterns. The effect on our journey was significant. We were venturing by lamp as it would have been seen in the 1800’s.

The next morning we toured the cave with electric lighting. While we didn’t see any bats the night before or today, we were assured there was a significant bat population in the cave. We believe them. We tried really hard to find some, but there were none to be found as far as we could tell.

We were assuming that our daytime tour would just be a repeat of what we had done the night before by lantern light. But we were pleasantly surprised. Pretty much except for entering through the original historical entrance to the cave network, we had a completely new tour, going to all different places than we had gone the night before. Bonus!

The significance of Mammoth Cave is its immense size – longest mapped system. But, because of the dense cap rock layer that made it easy for horse breeders to build walls prevented water from seeping into the caves, there are not significant stalactites and stalagmites, which need the dripping water to form. So while it was a great cave and worth visiting, the Woman was not as excited about it as she had hoped.

Some of the historical perspective was interesting. For most of its early life the cave was privately owned and operated as a tourism attraction. Back in the 1800’s one of the ways that guides made tips was to allow visitors to put their names on the cave walls and ceilings. They would use the torches they used for lighting as a carbon based pen to carve names. Because of the protective environment inside the cave, these centuries old inscriptions are still visible today. The signatures teach a lesson as well. In the early 1800’s an engineer involved in mapping, Mr. Tapscott, decided to leave his mark with one of the largest signatures we saw in the entire cave. But, while Mr. Tapscott was apparently a skilled engineer, he was not a skilled speller, and for centuries has been known by history as Mr. “Tapsott”!

Speaking of guides, we also learned that Mammoth Cave was an above average gig if you were a slave. Apparently black guides were allowed to keep their tips, and used the opportunity to hone their speaking skills and save money which would come in handy after 1864. One such guide was Stephen Bishop, a slave to Franklin Gorlin who bought the cave in 1838. Bishop developed a strong knowledge of the cave, and became one of the most popular guides, having many people visiting from Europe asking for him by name. It was a good gig because slaves got no respect in white society – but in the cave, white folk respected the guides, engaged with them on a human level, and entrusted their welfare to them as well. The Cave may have been one of the only places in the south where this happened.

He learned so much about the cave he began mapping it. In 1842 he spent two weeks in the cave mapping it by memory. His map was published in 1844 in Rambles in Mammoth Cave, and he was given full credit for it (very unusual at the time for a slave). Gorlin freed Bishop in 1856, and Bishop began acquiring land in the area using the money he earned from his guide work. He died in 1859, and is the only slave buried in The Old Guides’ Cemetery above the historic entrance to the cave. We made sure to take in his grave site before we headed out.

Talk to you soon!