Spring

 3/21- Natural Bridge State Park, Slade KY

   We had to go right through the heart of downtown Cincinnati this morning, ugh!  Fortunately it was Saturday morning and the traffic wasn’t too bad and we made it without incident. 

  This part of the trip was nothing special and in fact it was kind of boring. There was nothing particularly impressive about the landscape until we got to Paris. 

    Paris is the thoroughbred horse capital of the world. Secretariat was raised here. The road was lined with tens of miles of 4 board fences. I cringe at the number of trees that had to die to fence these horses in. At least this fence was black instead of white so you didn’t have to paint it as often as that would be a full time job. We probably saw the next Kentucky Derby winner grazing as we drove by. 

   We entered the Red River Gorge and made our way to our campsite. This is an impressive landscape of limestone pinnacles that the Red River has carved out. We are camped just beneath this large earthen dam. It is a little freaky thinking about all that water hanging over our heads. 

    We hiked UP to the Natural Bridge which actually looks like a bridge between two peaks. It’s probably around 100 feet high and 100 yards across. You hike up and cross underneath it and then there is a section of the trail that is so narrow you can’t put your feet side by side. Once at the top you can walk across it and continue along these sheer cliffs until you get to more look outs. 

   This trail was made in 1880 and is the original trail. Of course it was a beautiful Saturday and the place was crazy busy. We saw all kinds of people trudging up this steep trail. There were many children darting back and forth and parents lugging babies up. It turns out that there is a ski lift at the bottom ferrying tourists up to the top. You had to wait in line to get to some sections of the trail. 

   We had gotten the last campsite available for tonight but by tomorrow we will have our pick. Hopefully some of the trails will not have the same amount of traffic. 

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