We got on I-65 and within an hour were within the boundaries of the park. The deer population rivaled the number of people we saw on the way in. In fact, there were so few people on the way in that I began to wonder where everyone was for a June Saturday.
Mammoth Cave had been used by Native Americans for centuries. Legend has it that the first white settler to come across the natural entrance did so by chasing a bear through the woods. It was used as a saltpeter mine during the War of 1812, when the ingenuity of the slave laborers helped the United States produce gunpowder. (The British blockade made it impossible to import the gunpowder.) Soon after, the caves became the second-oldest continuous tourist attraction in the country (after Niagara Falls), and continued operation throughout the Civil War years, despite Kentucky's contested status as a border state. They were even used for a few years as a tuberculosis treatment, which ended when the physician who ran the program died of the same disease.
The most important figure from the early years of Mammoth Cave was Stephen Bishop, a slave and prominent cave explorer. The stories of Bishop's explorations are numerous and included he and another man dragging a cedar tree through the wider parts of the cave in order to shimmy their way across a drop known as the Bottomless Pit, all by the light of small lanterns. He died in 1857, one year after being freed.
The farms were bought out by the Kentucky government during the Great Depression and given to the federal government as a CCC project. (The underground trails pioneered by the CCC workers are the same ones used today, as are the hand-planted deciduous trees on the surface.) During the Cuban Missile Crisis, President Kennedy had Mammoth Cave turned into a fallout shelter, until they remembered that the temperature differential in summer and winter meant that the cave "breathed," rendering the cave useless as a fallout shelter.
The caves themselves have been hewn by water. The hard sandstone on the surface resists erosion while the soft limestone underneath is carried away by the underground river system. These formations, along with a number of sinkholes, are the defining features of a karst landscape.
At the end of the road, a park ranger motioned us into the overflow parking, where we got one of the last spots and endured a sweltering walk to the visitor's center. We got there incredibly early, and spent the time between getting there and the tour time touring their indoor exhibits and getting something to eat across a little bridge. (The food was standard but the clientele—which included Geraldo Rivera and Taylor Swift lookalikes, a baby with a mohawk, and an entire group of unrelated people who had pretty much the exact same face—was horrifyingly entertaining.)
Soon enough it was 1:40 and we were huddled under an outdoor shelter along with about 150 other people. Our tour guide was a retired geology teacher who was able to corral—and at least somewhat entertain—a large group of people. We were one of the first in line behind him for the entirety of the tour.
Our tour took us through the historic natural entrance and around the most explored two miles of the 400 that have so far been mapped. The 54-degree air blasted at us during our descent down the long staircase.
The first thing you see upon entering is the Rotunda, which is a truly epic room. I've been impressed by standing underneath man-made domes half its size. We then went deeper and deeper into the cave. As we evaded divots in the trail, the walls became narrower and the ceiling inched closer, until we turned a corner and had to duck down to avoid rocks above our heads, all while trying to navigate uneven steps by going down sideways and gripping the slick handrails.
From then through most of the remaining tour, we were in a constant state of concern for each other's heads and keeping them intact. The cave continued to narrow until a portion known as "Fat Man's Misery," when the rocks became so tight on every side we had to go sideways and bend over from the waist. This peculiar kind of crouch was the only way to navigate these bends.
At the bottom of the tour is a small amphitheater-like arrangement known as the Methodist Church. Everyone in the group sat down on these aluminum benches as the guide talked about the park's history and pointed out the high-water marks of famous area floods. He mentioned a spry 94-year-old former CCC worker who had visited the park a few years ago, a story that ended up in a geology-related pun, to which I—sitting in the front row—said "you really had to dig deep for that one!"
Yes, I nearly ended up in a pun war with a park ranger. (You know he would have lost.)
We went up a three-million-dollar staircase and out through wider passages, shimmying over a soapy mixture with our feet to wipe off possible fungi. (The one they are concerned about affects bats but not humans, and they want to keep this particular species confined to one cave.)
After two miles of these tight spaces and hard surfaces, we headed on up the road to Louisville and got to our hotel, where I witnessed the driver behind us exhibit what may very well be the first case of road rage in a parking deck.
Now, I have to say this: Kentucky is pretty backwards in their road sign philosophy. Thirty miles without a speed limit sign and then there would be two identical ones no less than thirty yards from each other—and, just so you know it wasn't a mistake, they repeated the formula with the signs even closer!
All of which brings us to Louisville, a city with a profoundly eclectic population. "Keep Austin Weird" and its more famous relative "Keep Portland Weird" have apparently inspired "Keep Louisville Weird." I've not ever been to Austin, but I can understand the similarities with Portland.
However, we're not going to lose sight of why we're here, and that is to get an original Hot Brown. Acquiring this open-faced sandwich is something we failed to do on our first trip and has steadily risen on my dad's bucket list until now. The Brown Hotel, home of the original Hot Brown, is an institution and remains pretty steadily booked.
Once at our hotel, we decided that we needed to eat a Hot Brown, but—much like the hotel itself—the restaurant was completely booked. We booked a brunch there at 10:00 tomorrow morning, but this only made us (well, my dad) hungrier for a proper meal beyond the dry and flimsy sandwiches at Mammoth Cave.
We ended up eating at a restaurant attached to the hotel. The complimentary appetizer were deep-fried balls of pimiento cheese, garnished with a spicy green sauce. My dad and I each had the hanger steak, widely regarded by steak enthusiasts but little-known outside the butcher's circle. While not at tender as a filet or even a slow-cooked roast, it had a great flavor and was slathered in an unidentifiable but delicious sauce, surrounded by small potatoes and tiny whole sweet onions. My mom managed to eat most of half an Amish chicken. (I don't know what makes it Amish, unless it was cooked without electricity or its name was Yoder.) They split an apple tartlet for dessert while I chowed down on more pimiento cheese balls—and judging from the reaction of our waiter, that was probably not a common dessert order.
The restaurant was constantly loud and made it impossible to have a conversation across the table without commandeering a megaphone. Adding to this mayhem were the chefs, who cooked on one side of the room—and we were sitting closest to them. Regardless, it was a show and a half, since the head chef was yelling bits of orders in technical lingo. At one of the rare lulls before our food arrived, my dad asked him what the funny-looking garnishes were. He said that they were watermelon radishes and gave us some to eat. (Both of my parents said that the things didn't have any flavor, but I found my bite positively repulsive. When will I learn to stop trying to eat garnishes?)
Tomorrow: tentatively, Springfield, Illinois.
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