September 30, 2011
Do you remember Isaac’s widemouth bass from last year’s World Equestrian Games?
It’s baaaaack …
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The fish is back in the water obstacle known as “The Spring,” awaiting marathon competitors at next weekend’s Kentucky Classic CDE, here at the KY Horse Park.
Stay tuned here next week for reports, photos, and videos from the event!
September 29, 2011
While in the office yesterday, we spied an absolutely enormous pair of wheels being unloaded from a flatbed trailer. So of course, I went out to get some photos.
It turns out they belonged to a device known by a variety of names: high-wheel logging cart, high wheels, logging wheels, and more.
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the enormous pair of ten-foot-tall wheels, after they were unloaded from the trailer but before they were separated and attached to their equally enormous axles
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a close-up of one of the two wheels after the entire contraption was put together
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This logging cart was brought to the KY Horse Park by the restorers: an Amish family (and their driver) from northern Indiana. According to the sign now attached to one of the wheels, the tires, spoke rings, and boxing in the wheels are original (from Michigan’s Upper Peninsula), and the wooden parts are either ash or oak. These types of vehicles were used from the late nineteenth century through the early twentieth century for getting logs out of forested logging areas. You can read more about these vehicles, and see some fascinating old photos of them in use, here.
August 31, 2011
Make plans to visit Lexington, Ky. this fall or winter!
On October 22, a fabulous new exhibit is set to open at the Kentucky Horse Park’s International Museum of the Horse. It will run through April 6, 2012.
With items on loan from the American Museum of Natural History’s recent blockbuster exhibit, “The Horse,” this new IMH exhibit portrays the horse’s influence on trade, transportation, labor, warfare, culture, and sports — using spectacular fossils, models, dioramas, and cultural objects from around the world.
You can read more about the exhibit and see photos here and here.
August 17, 2011
I know you’re thinking, “huh?” But, yes, you read that correctly: we’re talkin’ college basketball in August.
Regular / longtime readers of the blog will know that I occasionally write about Lexington goings-on and about our Univ. of Kentucky basketball team.
And, yes, I do realize that we’re still in August and, therefore, closer to the college football season (which you won’t read about here on the blog) than basketball season. But, we’ve just had a little exhibition game here in town, and I wanted to tell you about it.
Our own Coach Calipari is spending part of the summer coaching the Dominican Republic National team, as they attempt to qualify for the FIBA World Championship. They came to town several days ago to practice, and to play in an exhibition game in Rupp Arena.
And who were their opponents, you ask? Well, they were the “Pros” … a team made up exclusively of current-NBA, former-UK players. Our Univ. of KY all-star team, you might say. Except that, according to the NCAA, there could be no official references to the University of Kentucky Wildcats in promoting, or during, the game. Nevermind that the game was a complete sellout (24,000 people … in August), or that fans came from all over the state, wearing their favorite UK-blue shirts, or that every one of the “Pros” and the current UK player on the Dominican team all received applause and ovations worthy of rockstars …
It was a fun game, and players and fans alike all seemed to really enjoy the event and the atmosphere.
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before the game, the teams lined up on the court, and singers performed the national anthems of both the Dominican Republic and the United States
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the "Pros" huddled by their bench before the start of the game
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the players on the Pros team arrived in town the day before the game, at the end of their summer vacations (so no one was in prime basketball shape) and had one practice session together, the morning of the game ... they ended up losing to the Dominican team, but no one in the stands really seemed to care; it was just too much fun to see them all playing in Rupp Arena again
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even though we're closer in time to football season than to basketball season, Rupp Arena was completely sold out for this special exhibition game
August 9, 2011
After Saturday’s blog post, you probably thought we were going to drive over to Louisville to see the hot rod cars.
Well, here’s what we did instead.
This weekend, three World War II-era planes (two bombers and a fighter) owned by the Collings Foundation flew into our local airport to spend about three days. For a small fee, anyone who wanted to could walk around, look at the fighter plane, and actually crawl around inside the bombers. Needless to say, we wanted to. Crawl, however, was indeed the operative word here, as the entrances, exits, and interior spaces were all really, really tight.
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people waiting to climb inside the B17; climbing the ladder looks easy enough, but once inside the exterior door, you had to get on hands and knees to crawl though an opening into the main compartment
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those of us in line, about to climb into the B17, reflected in the propeller's nose
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a view of the ball turret from inside the B17 ...
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... and the same one from outside; it's pretty easy to see the inspiration for a few Star Wars weapons, no?
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to get into the B24, you had to crawl through a door that's *underneath* the tail; here are a couple of children by the entrance ladder for scale
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and, for a better idea of how low to the ground this door is, here's A.J. about to climb in
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one view of the ball turret in the B24
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... and the view of the other side of the same ball turret
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that little strip that's about two feet wide (that's two human feet, not 24 inches) is the "walkway" through the bomb bay; here the doors are open
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another view of the bomb bay in the B24; here I was actually standing on the ground in the open bay, underneath the "bomb"
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and, finally, the beautiful "Betty Jane," a P51 fighter plane
The Slower Road 