A day in Louisville

This past Thursday we returned from a quick two-day trip to Louisville, Kentucky, home of bourbon, horse-racing legends and the Speed Museum of Art. That's right, the primary reason for visiting was the exhibition "Women Artists in Paris 1850-1900" at the Speed Museum on the University of Louisville campus. More about that shortly.

It was sunny and warm as we pulled out of our driveway heading for the open road, a gorgeous day for travel. We sped quickly down US 131 to US 31 and then switched to I65 around Indianapolis. After about 6 hours we pulled into our hotel, the Galt House located right on the Ohio River.  The city had recently been inundated by flash floods  as you can see below.

note the tops of the lamposts on the riverfront walkway

even George Rogers Clark thought the river out of control

looking over to Jeffersonville, Indiana

the hotel and then some

Still, we had most of the hotel -- which was HUGE -- to ourselves. On top of that they upgraded us to a suite. Sadly we had no business meetings scheduled so much of the space was wasted -- I mean, really,  a living room, bath and separate bedroom? But we made the most of it.

York, the slave and companion of William Clark (as in Lewis and Clark)

After settling in and before heading out for dinner we strolled up and down Main Street in downtown. One of the more interesting sights as we walked was the home of the Louisville Slugger. Fond memories of Little League in central Illinois.

That evening we ate a pair of the best burgers avec frites in the world -- yep, Paul, you were right -- at the Holy Grale in the Bardstown Road section of Louisville.

Our fine weather left us soon enough and the next morning promised gray skies and rain. Before the skies opened up, however, we scooted over to Cave Hill Cemetery to look for the grave of Moses Bigelow, a former member of the 3rd Michigan Infantry who died in a hospital in Louisville in 1864.

Inclement weather notwithstanding the cemetery was, in a word fantastic: nearly 300 acres with over 135,000 burials, including more than 5,000 union soldiers in the national cemetery portion,  Cave Hill rivals Mt. Auburn in Cambridge, MA for the loveliness of its garden layout. It is also home to many wonderful monumental sculptures, of which just a handful are shown below.

Boses Bigelow, section B, grave 1777

Gauthemey

Peaslee

Larmee in section U

Hall in section U

Muhammad Ali in section U

As the rain began to worsen we left the cemetery and turned our attention -- and the car -- in the direction of our purpose in coming to Louisville: the art exhibition at the Speed Museum:

photo copyright © Speed Museum website

Featuring 80 works by 37 different artists including Marie Bracquemond, Berthe Morisot, Mary Cassatt, Louise Abbéma, Rosa Bonheur, and Cecilia Beaux, it did not disappoint.

In the Studio, 1881, by Marie Bashkirtseff

and that's Marie with the palette looking off to her right

The Meeting (detail), 1884, Marie Bashkirtseff 

Lunch in the Greenhouse, 1877, by Louise Abbéma

that's Louise's self-portrait on the right, and Sarah Bernhardt in the white dress

Sita and Sarita (Women with a cat), detail, 1893-94, by Cecilia Beaux

Young women in church, n.d., by Marie Petiet

Peasant woman from Normandie, 1889, Asta Nørregaard

there were dabs of paint in the wheat to create effect of flecks of gold -- stunning!

We ate lunch at the museum cafe before visiting the remaining exhibitions, but after the "Women in Paris" exhibition and aside from Jean Fragonard's The Reader, the rest was anticlimactic.

Since we still had plenty of daylight left we decided to take a tour of one of the city's numerous bourbon distilleries. While eating lunch I went online and zim-zam we were reserved for a 3:00pm tour and tasting of the Angel's Envy distillery in downtown Louisville.

Leaving the museum in the driving rain, and before going back downtown, we drove a bit further south of the city to at least see Churchill Downs, home of the Kentucky Derby. The place, like our hotel, was HUGE, and if the ongoing construction was any indication, it was going to be even bigger by the time horse-racing season begins. 

We turned back north to downtown and back to the hotel. where we we left our car in the garage and walked to Angel's Envy, a mere 8 or 9 blocks down Main Street. We spent the next hour or so being entertained by our tour guide, Brent, who led our group of ten or so through the production facility. He was funny, knowledgeable and during the tasting portion helped ease us newbies into the finer art of tasting bourbon whiskey.

While we're not sold on making a switch from our love of fermented grape juice to fermented corn and grain mash, it was a fun time and after the tasting we sampled bourbon cocktails at the bar.

That evening we had another lovely dining experience -- this time right across the street from our hotel at Milkwood. Susan had the fried chicken plate Asian-style and I had bibimbap, a kimchi and rice with "kentuckiyaki" pulled pork. Delicious!

The next morning was gray with the perennial drizzle as we left Louisville and headed north. Just short of Indianapolis we ran into serious rain which remained a serious annoyance until we neared the Michigan border where, naturally, it turned to wet snow.

Still, the trip back to Grand Rapids was uneventful and we made good time. 

Louisville is in the throes of serious revitalization and while it has some ways to go -- fair amount of depressed areas still abound even downtown -- much remains to be savored for both the palate as well as the soul.