Louisville with kids is an awesome trip. Originally we were going to spend a long weekend camping at Mammoth Cave with our pop-up camper but I was worried it would be too cold this early in the season. Instead, we set our eyes on Louisville for a One Tank Trip (from Indianapolis). We were pleasantly surprised with our entire adventure. At only two hours away from home, Louisville, Kentucky made for a great host to our family and we will be back!
Louisville with Kids
Saturday
Saturday morning we packed up the car and picked up our friends to join us on on the ride to Louisville. We left at 8:30 with every intention of being at the Flame Run Glassblowing studio around open. We arrived and realized they were closed that weekend and the following for the Thunder Over Louisville festival and Kentucky Derby. It was easy to find an alternate attraction because there are so many family fun activities within walking distance.
Louisville Slugger Museum and Factory
We chose to visit the Louisville Slugger Museum & Factory after seeing the 120 foot bat towering over the neighboring buildings. Although our family enjoys sitting in the outfield at the Indian’s games, we are not huge baseball fans. Each of us were pleasantly surprised and intrigued by the history, hands on experiences and factory tour of how the bats are made. Did you know 90-120 bats are ordered per player each season? The good news is that Hillerich & Bradsby Co. owns about 6,500 acres of timberland in Pennsylvania and New York. The company also purchases lumber from other sources. They plant more trees than they cut down to make around 3,000 bats each day in the factory.
Thunder Over Louisville
After the museum we headed over to some festival we saw people walking to with wagons, chairs and coolers in tow. We quickly realized there was a hugely popular air show along both sides of the Ohio River. People were camped out with coolers, mini grills, blankets and everything you’d need for a day along the river for 11 hours!
Thunder Over Louisville hosted over 1 million people at this years event on both the Kentucky and Indiana borders. There are two options when visiting the festival: 1.) You can pay for tickets and be within the venue area where they will have the Chow Wagon and a myriad of other events taking place within the fenced off area (not to mention all of these events surrounding the festival.) Keep in mind that there is a long list of things you are not allowed to bring inside the venue area. 2.) You can get really lucky as novice attenders and still spend 5 hours hanging out and enjoying the festival with fair food trucks galore, beautiful parks and the amazing air show overhead.
We were ready to head to the hotel pool after forgetting to apply sunscreen so we did not stay for the firework show or the massive hoards of traffic after the air show. We found a hotel about 15 minutes outside of the city for a much more affordable rate which had two queen suites, a hotel and a continental breakfast.
Sunday
After breakfast Sunday we headed over to the Kentucky Science Center. I’m lucky enough to visit our Indianapolis Children’s Museum each week and very low expectations for the science center. We were all very pleasantly surprised by it’s size and scope! There are five floors with exhibits ranging from Earth science to technology to art and discovery. We spent four hours here and still have more to see for next time. We brought a sack lunch to have while there but there is a SUBWAY on site as well as a movie theater. Be sure to check out the demonstration times. We saw a physics and chemistry demonstration that were both very entertaining!
Louisville, Kentucky was an awesome family friendly city with lots to do within walking distance. We will have to come back to check out the glass blowing studio and a few other things we missed. What are some of your favorite Louisville attractions or eats?