Homeless on Memorial Day Weekend in Bowling Green, Kentucky

As we left Kentucky's Land Between the Lakes, we were staring right at the busy Memorial Day weekend--and we had no campground reservations. This could be a full-time RVer's worst nightmare. Campgrounds are always booked up for busy holiday weekends! But we've been doing this long enough that we aren't worried about being homeless on Memorial Day weekend. So we calmly made the drive east through the wheat fields of Kentucky. Today we're driving through Hopkinsville, Kentucky--"The Batter Capitol of the World!?!" Because of the ready supply of wheat, they have factories in town that make box mixes for Ghirardelli Brownies, Red Lobster Cheddar Bay Biscuits, Cracker Barrel Biscuits, and all the Krusteaz pancakes, waffles, muffins, etc. We were very sad to find out there were no factory tours in Hopkinsville! 

Our first possible option for a Friday-night-of-a-holiday-weekend overnight parking spot is at Triplett's Barbecue. We'd read that they allow RVs to stay overnight in the gravel section of the parking lot next to a corn field. After eating barbecue, we confirmed with the manager who gave us an "Absolutely!" response to our request to spend the night. We also found out they had live music that evening, so it was a great place to be homeless!

The next day's drive took us east on Highway 68. This is a four-lane highway, and we never remember seeing Amish buggies on such a well-traveled highway.

But we would see six different buggies, and their horses weren't spooked by the big trucks that blew by them going 65 miles per hour.

We also saw this Amish bicyclist with a big load, not far from our side mirror. He wasn't spooked when a big motor home blew right by him going 65 miles per hour. 

We might be without camping reservations, but we're not without a plan. We've already checked with Cabella's in Bowling Green, Kentucky, and they welcome RVs to overnight in their parking lot.

We had a lovely shaded spot on the edge of the parking lot. After settling the motor home into this nice spot, we set off to explore the sites of Bowling Green, Kentucky.

The most popular tourist spot in town is the National Corvette Museum. While we are used to seeing special handicapped parking spaces near entrances, this parking lot had another set of best spots reserved for owners of Corvettes.

We found out that brand new owners of Corvettes can pick them up right here at the museum. Today, this gentleman is picking up his new orange convertible. He got one-on-one training on all the car's gadgets, before he drove it off the museum floor. We watched as two different people took ownership of the new Corvettes they had ordered.

We also noted that Corvette has a new model on display here at the museum. This is the LT2--the new mid-engine Stingray Corvette.

Besides the museum, visitors can practice driving a Corvette right in the lobby. A three-paneled digital screen displays the race track with its twists and turns. The driver in the car is experiencing all the motion of the ride--including the bumps when he missed the curves and ran off the track.

Kids of all ages enjoyed playing the race car games inside this section of the museum. They were hurrying to get that tire changed while their car was in the pit stop.

We enjoyed playing with this game, that allowed us to change the angle and trajectory of ramps and race our hot wheels cars. Our sons would have loved this!

All things are Corvette at this museum. Even the bathrooms have a Corvette label!

Among all the Corvettes we were surprised to see some unusual characters here in Bowling Green. We found out that there is a Comic-con convention in town for the Memorial Day Weekend.

It seems like Bowling Green is home to many fast cars, and they like to test that speed at the Motorsports Park. We drove in to see what was going on here on a holiday weekend. A very nice woman explained that people can bring their cars here to practice their racing skills on this very long track. We could see five different parts of the race track from our spot on the viewing platform. There are also teachers that will ride along and give instruction. With the price of gas, it seemed like lots of dollars were being wasted racing around this track to nowhere.

We also saw evidence of the December storms that came right through Kentucky. Two different tornadoes touched down--ten days apart in different sections of this state. One of those tornadoes took off the walls of the garage at the motorsports park.

Our next stop this holiday weekend is West Kentucky University. It was here that Mark and Abe were contemplating life while sharing a bench on campus.

They were sitting in front of the Kentucky Museum that is hosted by the university.

One of the first displays inside is the university mascot welcoming visitors to the museum. When we asked, we found out that this is the "Red Blob."

We were more impressed with the red blob when we figured out that he was completely made of legos.

That was quite an engineering feat to make a red blob with the WKU insignia on his chest. 

Denisa enjoyed the quilt display found on the third floor of the museum. A local woman collected "crazy quilts" that were made during the 1800s. Half of her collection was donated to the Kentucky Museum. Instead of precisely cut pieces that make a precise pattern like most quilts, these are made from crazy shapes and sewn together in crazy patterns.

But Denisa marveled at the hand stitching that decorates the seams of each crazy piece of fabric. Even though they looked like machine-stitching, they were carefully hand stitched. Amazing!

This museum also included more traditional displays of furniture and home furnishings, arranged together according to age and style.

But one of the most interesting displays was tucked away in this corner of the museum. We depend so much on internet reviews that give us opinions on places to eat and things to do. But in the 1930s and 1940s, the best source for that information were the books written by a guy from Bowling Green, Kentucky--Duncan Hines.

The museum display described his following and the way that America came to trust his opinion for good quality. So when a company from Nebraska looked for a spokesman for their line of baking mixes, they asked him to lend his name.

This is the line of mixes that came to be known as Duncan Hines in 1948. Denisa has been buying those mixes all her life, and never thought about the person behind that brand. This is an educational Memorial weekend!

The museum also describes the Felts pioneer home that was built near here more than 200 years ago. It was moved on campus in 1980, and it was interesting to see it first-hand after learning about the Felts family and their home inside the museum.

Downtown Bowling Green has a pretty "Fountain Square," and we parked and took a few pictures in their historic downtown area.

Besides a nice fountain, there are also some nice flowers downtown. 

The last stop of the day was the Baker Arboretum on the edge of town. You won't be surprised to see that Denisa is taking pictures of more nice flowers, 

as well as a nicely done water feature.

Besides fish and water lilies, it looks like this pond also has a population of frogs. A new layer of eggs covered one of the lily pads in the center of the pond.

Adjacent to the Arboretum is the Downing Museum. Joseph Downing was raised in this part of Kentucky, but spent most of his life in France. It was there that this Kentucky boy developed his unusual art style.

The large hanging pieces of art are actually made in pieces, and then connected together. When we looked carefully at the seams, we saw the ornamental bent nails and it reminded us of the crazy quilts from earlier today.

This art was a little crazy too!

We would like to say that being homeless on Memorial Day Weekend was a total success. Both of our boondocking spots were level and safe, and they allowed us to eat well and visit some fun spots in central Kentucky. We were also blessed with delightfully cool weather, that made staying in a motor home without air-conditioning very comfortable. But in an attempt to tell the bad with the good, we have to say that our free parking spots weren't without their problems. A refrigerated truck pulled in beside us the first night close enough that it vibrated Mark awake. The second night at Cabela's, we had a late-night meeting of the drag-racing club that squealed their tires as they hot-rodded out of the parking lot well after midnight. Some times free parking spots are not the quietest places to spend the night! But we still had a good time despite being homeless on Memorial Day weekend in Kentucky.