Travel as far away as the American West and Asia without adding more than a handful of miles to your car. Because of the pandemic, travelers have been uncovering or rediscovering the joy and adventure of exploring close to home. But that doesn’t mean you can’t get away to parts unknown. The Georgetown Jail Trail, the Deadliest Catch, Around the World – pack up and hit the road on these themed travel jaunts that give that far-away flavor while keeping you safe near home.
Get your meditation on in the sister-city of Tahara, Japan.
• Yuko-En on the Elkhorn: Find serenity in this four-season, five-plus acre Japanese-style strolling garden filled with Kentucky native plants. The Kentucky-Japan Friendship Garden is a world filled with waterfalls, graceful sculptural elements and a Japanese-style stone garden that inspires quiet reflection.
• Anniemals: This is the working art studio of Annie Brady, who does Raku firing at Yuko-en and usually has a few pieces of pottery for sale, along with paintings, drawings and other works.
• Thai Garden Restaurant: Tuck into dishes that have some customers swooning, like the Chicken Pineapple Fried Rice and Drunken Noodles.
• Country Boy Brewing: The four country boys who founded what has become one of Kentucky’s most famous watering holes bring a Japanese ethos to their beermaking. “The Japanese are known as extremely good craftsmen,” says co-owner DH Harrison. “We like to pay homage to the culture, the importance of quality and dedication to craft.”
• Bleubird Studio: Book a yoga class or grab your mat and to solo to the yoga studio of this new three-story home, featuring two private guestrooms, each with en suite bath. Rock away the day on a balcony porch overlooking farmland.
A checkered past? Georgetown? Follow the trail for tales of bank robbers and old jails.
• Royal Spring Welcome Center – The staff at the Old Scott County Jail used to welcome prisoners. Now the staff greets visitors to Georgetown in the same space, which also has an exhibit about the adjacent Old Jail.
• Historic Stamping Ground Jail: See the brick two-cell jail built circa 1890 at 3374 Main Street that became famous for surviving two fires and a tornado.
• Historic Buffalo Geocaching Trail: The outlaw Jesse James never spent time in the Stamping Ground Jail – but he did visit relatives in the area and had a personal tie to one particular house in this tiny town, the place where his parents married on Dec. 28, 1841. Find it at 406 Locust Fork Pike.
• Abby Mae’s: A changing room in the bank vault, a bullet hole in the bathroom. In 1929, a would-be robber – a bank president no less! – shot himself here; nearly 100 years later, shop owner Sarah Christian has filled the space with clothes so cute, it’s nearly criminal.
• The Kitchen at Country Boy Brewing: Dip a jumbo Bavarian pretzel in Nacho Bait Beer Cheese and wash it down with a can of Shotgun Wedding
• Buffalo Springs Distillery: This Airbnb was never a jail, although with its stone façade, one might think it had a prison past. But no. The building once housed the main office and gatehouse of the former Buffalo Springs Distilling Company and you can now book the entire residence as your plush and private getaway.
Cowpokes and quilters, hatchets and horses, patchwork patterns and pizza pie. Take a trip to the American West by stagecoach-style passenger cars.
• Whispering Woods Riding Stables: Ride like a cowboy or girl across the open prairie – in this case, 250 acres of Kentucky backcountry.
• Buffalo Gals Quilt Barn Trail: Quilting bees are a uniquely American social custom that once thrived among pioneer women. This driving tour lacks the gossip that accompanied quilting bees back then but not the beautiful handiwork of the needlesmiths.
• Georgetown & Scott County Museum: Stagecoaches were a familiar site in the American West and three precision-model stagecoach-style passenger cars are on display in the museum’s DeWitt Collection, built from scratch in cast aluminum, brass, hammered steel sheets and wood.
• Birdsong Quilting, Embroidery and Crafts: Fabrics, notions, sewing machines, classes – it’s the kind of shop pioneer women pined for.
• FatKats: Bite into pizza worth circling the wagons for – the award-winning Cowboy Extreme, a mouthwatering pie topped with barbecue sauce, cheese, chicken, onions, bacon and banana peppers.
• Queenslake Bed and Breakfast: Horses, wide-open spaces, lakes – it’s as peaceful as the Old West at sundown.
Globetrot three continents – Asia, Europe and North America – from the Arabian desert to a Japanese meditation garden, the Mississippi delta to the English countryside, an authentic Irish pub to a Greek-esque shopping experience.
• Al-Marah Arabian Horse Galleries at Kentucky Horse Park: Journey through art, literature and film in a Bedouin setting to see the horse that changed the world.
• Yuko-En on the Elkhorn: Step through the Tokugawa Gates and enter a spa for the soul and senses.
• Meraki and Moon: My big, fat Greek shopping trip here (meraki is Greek for passion) means poking among the works of 40 visionary artists in a creative market atmosphere. Oh, and there’s a wine tap.
• Broussard’s Delta Kitchen: Jambalaya, Crawfish Étouffée, Chicken Creole – savor the flavors of The Big Easy in downtown Georgetown.
• Slainte Public House: “May your heart be light and happy, may your smile be big and wide, and may your pockets always have a coin or two inside!” Yes, tipping a pint at this Irish pub brings out the Irish sayings.
• Alexander Bradford House: It may be early 1800s Kentucky, but this home on the National Register of Historic Places feels more “Merry Olde England” with its English cottage sensibility.
Cast yourself into an adrenaline-pumping episode of the Discovery Channel’s wildly popular reality TV series. Okay, so Elkhorn Creek isn’t the Bering Sea and smallmouth bass aren’t Alaskan king crab, but make no mistake . . . adventure Georgetown-style awaits.
• Fishing at Elkhorn Creek: Navigate gravel shoals, rocky banks and woody debris as you cast your line for smallmouth bass, largemouth bass and rock bass.
• Veterans Wildlife Management Area: Oh the variety! Striped bass, blue catfish, shellcrackers, muskellunge, crappie. And it’s not just fishing. There’s deer, squirrel, rabbit and turkey hunting, too.
• Georgetown & Scott County Museum: Come say hello to Pete the Talking Crow, who wound up on the wrong end of a deadliest catch, the victim of a rifle-toting kid.
• Bluegrass Outdoor Shop: Gear up for your own deadliest catch adventure at this hunting and fishing outdoor shop. Bonus: Everything is Kentucky made.
• Rodney’s on Broadway: Killer seafood is on the menu: char-broiled salmon, panko-crusted grouper and sautéed diver sea scallops and shrimp smothered with the chef’s secret-recipe Woodford Reserve bourbon cream sauce.
• Country Boy Brewing: Ask for a cold Cougar Bait – it’s the one with the guy fishing on the can.
• Longview Stay and Play: No deadly wildlife – just a great location right next to the first tee at these golf course apartment units.
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Sadieville, Kentucky – A tiny town in transition
Written by Kathy Witt
From a town once known for raising mules to one popular with cyclists for its rural bicycle routes, especially beautiful during fall foliage season, Sadieville is a tiny town whose railroading heritage intersects with community pride.
Said Mayor Robbie Wagoner: “Sadieville is a town in transition that hangs onto its past while embracing the future.
“City Hall is the old train station,” he added. “It’s gone from harboring mules to fiber optics, utilizing both the past and the future to make it work.”
Sadieville is also a town full of surprises.
“Come and drive down Pike Street under the railroad pass and onto Main Street and you’ll see dry-laid rock walls, all redone and just beautiful,” said Mayor Robbie. “Come into our little town and there’s the pavilion and little depot sitting there and the new mural.”
The mural, depicting Sadieville’s mule history and railroading ties and including the town namesake, Mrs. Sarah “Sadie” Emison Pack, standing beneath a parasol, is something of an optical illusion. It is positioned so that the restored Sadieville Train Car, a historic 1955 caboose located a few feet from an active Norfolk-Southern Rail Line, appears to be the last car of a train chugging along the railroad tracks.
Main Street shows off a splendid collection of late Victorian-era and early twentieth-century residential architecture. Flowers add splashes of color to tidy lawns. A downtown, listed on the National Register of Historic Places, is well tended. A circa 1917 Rosenwald School, one of the many state-of-the art schools built across the South in the early 20th century for African American children, has been restored.
Besides cyclists, geocachers love Sadieville. The caboose is one of two documented Sadieville geocaching sites on the Scott County GeoTrot. And because this historic train car shows off not only original equipment and fixtures, but sits amidst a former railway town, railroading buffs flock to it as well.
“We have a lot of them who visit and take pictures of the railcars coming through Sadieville,” said Mayor Robbie.
Sadieville’s rural landscape means miles of hiking trails and nearby horseback and mountain bike trails. It is a bird watcher’s paradise, and hunters and fishers similarly find what they’re looking for at the Veteran’s Memorial Wildlife Management Area.
Incorporated 140 years ago in 1880, the town was originally called “The Big Eagle” because of its location on Eagle Creek. Even more significant for the town was its selection by Cincinnati Southern Railroad – one of the greatest and most lucrative railways in the south – as a key shipping point. Records from 1904 note that 216 cars filled with stock, logs and tobacco, which amounted to thousands of dollars, shipped from Sadieville. That same year, over $13,000 worth of rabbits, hides, produce and other goods were shipped by Sadieville merchants.
But that’s not all. The town was the largest market in the country for shipping yearling mules and colts. The firm, Burgess and Gano, purchased the majority of these animals in Sadieville and shipped them to various points in Georgia.
The young mules and colts were corralled in the countryside and once three or four hundred had been delivered by the stock raisers, drivers would round them up and drive them to Sadieville stockyards alongside the railroad tracks. An advance team of men would alert residents that the “mules were coming” so they could prepare for the thick cloud of dust – at times as dense as a heavy fog – the animals would raise stampeding into town.
Because of Sadie Pack’s efforts in helping the railroading construction crews that set up their base of operations here, the town’s name was eventually changed to Sadieville as a way to honor her.
Projects currently in the works in Sadieville include a Main Street Victorian transforming into a bed and breakfast inn; several homes under construction by Habitat for Humanity; a skatepark addition to Pike Street Park; and the multimillion dollar development of the Interstate Exchange at Exit 136.
Information about Sadieville’s bicycling routes and other outdoor recreation can be found on the Sadieville “Things To Do” page.
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Mural, Mural On The Wall...
Written by Dylan Marson
They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but a mural is a window into a community’s soul. Georgetown is home to a wealth of Kentucky artistry and culture, some of which can be found immortalized on the very walls that downtown shoppers pass by every day. Whether you're posing for your next instagram photoshoot, or simply appreciating their charm, every brush stroke on these works of art tells a story to those who stop to admire them. Discover these beautiful scenes scattered across the historic walls of Georgetown/Scott County and peer into the unbridled spirit of the Bluegrass through the creative minds who made them.
Unbridled Spirit of Horse Country
South Court Alley is known for its unmatched ability to light up an evening stroll through the picturesque streets of Downtown Georgetown, but it’s also home to one of the town’s landmark murals. Serving as a symbol of how Scott County became known as the unofficial Horse Headquarters of Kentucky, visitors can experience the heart of horse country through this red-brick window into the unfiltered equestrian beauty of the Bluegrass. The perfect selfie destination, nothing says "I was at Georgetown" like a picture with this iconic work of art. Make sure you turn around and look up for a quick shot of history, or maybe just some S.S.S. tonic for the blood, one of several historic wall-ads dotted across Georgetown.
A Colorful Welcome To Downtown
For many years, Spot Gelato has been a colorful splash of pink on the streets of Historic Downtown Georgetown. Now with the newest addition to our collection of murals, their building provides a colorful welcome to our home in the Bluegrass! If you're making a visit to our local shops & restaurants, this is a perfect spot for a selfie to mark the occasion.
A Flash of the Past
Transport yourself back to a different time with these unique wall-ads, painting a sense of nostalgia and times now gone on the sides of Georgetown’s historic buildings. You may be familar with White Owl Cigars, but you probably won't see them selling for just a nickel any time soon. For those who want to see a snapshot of America nearly a century ago, these two paintings are sure to deliver. Here in the heart of downtown Georgetown, history couldn't be more alive!
Bon Voyage!
Set sail from Downtown Georgetown at this hidden gem, offering a majestic view of the sea along a rustic red-brick alleyway just across from our local “Hidden Trove” of decorations, gifts and artwork. One of Georgetowns more hidden art pieces, the colorful billowing sails and other-worldly waters are a welcome surprise which contrasts against the classic small-town Americana that surrounds it. The scene is almost a memory or a dream of the sea, clouded by time and captured by an artists hands. We could all use a little escape to the ocean from time to time, however small or two-dimensional.
The Garden of Butterflies
A hidden home for butterflies seated behind the Georgetown/Scott County Museum? This colorful artwork is accompanied by a butterfly garden that attracts the town’s smaller residents for some summertime-fun. Smell the flowers, enjoy the view and stop by the local museum to discover the rich history behind the storied streets of Georgetown. Founded in 1790, Georgetown truly embodies the heart of the Bluegrass. Home of Kentucky's oldest stacked stone bridge, the first paper mill west of the Appalchains, centuries of equestrian heritage and the Birthplace of Bourbon, you'll find no shortage of stories to be told in these historic streets. For more Georgetown history, click here!
Tiny Wings for Tiny Paws
Animal lovers will love this tiny wing mural, the perfect backdrop for your tiny furry friends to make their next post on Instagram! Find this spot right in front of The Wine Project & Fabled Forest, where you can pair the perfect wine with the perfect book for a cozy afternoon in Historic Downtown Georgetown.
Miss Sadie Watches Over Her Town
Take a stroll through this quiet railroad town whose history is reflected through this mural. Sadieville is a Kentucky town steeped in history, founded along one of the most lucrative railroads in the south and home to a historic Rosenwald School. Its signature Sadieville train-car now sits alongside the Active Norfolk-Southern Rail Line, maintaining the sights and sounds of the town's railway heritage to this day. You can almost hear the the sounds of the rolling, screeching locomotives and bumbling wagons in this vivid depiction of a small town's founding days. For more Sadieville history, click here!
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Storytelling with a Country Boy: Daniel “DH” Harrison talks dreams, brews, horses
5/23/19 Written by Kathy Witt
Back in 2008, when he was living and working in Japan, Daniel “DH” Harrison was a Kentucky country boy with a big dream. He fantasized about owning a brewery, thinking at the time it was really just a pipe dream. Today, as one of the four founders of Georgetown’s Country Boy Brewing, opened in 2012, DH is living that dream.
While craft beer’s fab four (DH, Jeff Beagle, Nathan Coppage and Evan Coppage) don’t make Japanese beer, the spirit of Japanese craftsmanship is very much at work in the award-winning brewery, along with a healthy dose of Kentucky hospitality.
“We’re not a bar. We’re not a restaurant. We’re not a place where it’s easy not to talk to anybody,” he said. “The taproom has its own life. It’s all different ages and likes – some don’t even drink beer – and the regulars love to welcome out-of-towners. It’s a very cool, whole feeling. It fosters community conversation.”
Lest you think the beer isn’t part of the discussion, the main thing folks at the taproom remark on is the quality and absolute freshness of the beer. A number of the brews have shot to the top of the pop charts, including all four of Country Boy’s core flaves: Cougar Bait, Shotgun Wedding, Halfway Home and Cliff Jumper – DH’s personal favorite.
“People want to have an experience; they want more than just a beer or dinner,” he said. “It’s the whole experience – drinking the beer, sitting on the patio, looking at the beautiful scenery. They want to drink in the culture. The taproom vibe is part of that.”
It’s exactly the kind of place one would expect to step up to save a horse they discovered shares a name with one of their flagship brands: Cougar Bait. When the owners learned last year that the horse (a Dark Bay nine-year-old gelding by Gigawatt, out of the mare Silver Gloss, bred in Louisiana) had retired from racing and was for sale, they decided to bring him to Georgetown to another venue with a great vibe: Old Friends Thoroughbred Retirement Farm.
“We couldn’t let Cougar Bait go by the wayside, but he couldn’t live at the brewery,” said DH. “Michael Blowen, founder of Old Friends, graciously agreed to allow him to live out his final years there.
“We’re big fans of Michael and his mission,” he added. “Now Cougar Bait’s living the high life, really living like a king like all the rest of the horses there.”
Recently, the brewery added The Kitchen to be able to offer food onsite that reflects the ethos of Country Boy. Designed by Kentucky chef Joe Malone, the menu isn’t typical pub grub and diners won’t find any fried foods.
“It’s not French fries and chicken wings, even though I love both those things,” said DH. “It’s flat breads, hummus, sandwiches, like Italian and roast beef served on baguettes with spring greens. It’s real and authentic and complements the beer.”
The Kitchen isn’t the only addition for Country Boy Brewing. Last year the brewery acquired four acres to round their land up to a 10-acre complex. A 19,000-sq. ft. expansion is underway that should be complete by the end of 2019 and features additional storage, testing lab and canning line. But don’t expect these country boys to forget where they came from.
“We got big ideas,” said DH, “But we try to be good stewards of our growth.”
**Storytelling with a Country Boy is a part of a narrative blog series written through the eyes of Georgetown, Kentucky's most decorated storytellers.
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Celebrate Georgetown’s Japanese Connections
Written by Kathy Witt
Did you know Georgetown has a sister city? Tahara, Japan, located in Aichi Prefecture in central Honshu Island, is an area known for its rich cultural heritage and landmarks including the restored 17th-century fortress of Nagoya Castle and the Toyota Commemorative Museum of Industry and Technology.
The two cities have quite a lot in common. Both are fairly small, but growing fast. Both have an agricultural base and both have car manufacturing plants owned by Toyota Motor Company.
Photo of Toyota Plant in Tahara, Japan by Toyota Global
Toyota Motor Corporation’s Tahara plant, opened in January 1979, is known as the most computerized and robotized automotive plant in the world. Lexus brand vehicles are produced here – in fact, the plant creates a Lexus every 87 seconds. That’s 675 Lexus models per day! Georgetown is the home of Toyota Motor Manufacturing Kentucky, the largest Toyota Manufacturing Plant in the world and home of the Camry, Avalon and Lexus ES 350.
It was the Toyota tie that led to the sister city relationship that began in 1990, four years after Toyota broke ground in Georgetown. Today, there are several ways to celebrate Georgetown’s Japanese ties:
Photo of Toyota Visitor Center in Georgetown, Kentucky by TMMA
1. Take a free tram tour of Toyota Motor Manufacturing Kentucky. You’ll zip through the plant and witness the art of building some of the most popular cars in the United States at the hands of live and robotic workers. Visitors can also take a few laps around a racetrack in a NASCAR simulator and experience the luxury of slipping behind the wheel of a just-off-the-assembly-line Camry. Imagine – zero miles!
Photo of Yuko-En by Wanda Chiles
2. Lower your blood pressure at Yuko-en on the Elkhorn. An homage to Tahara, Japan, it is a four-season, five-acre garden place of peace and the only official Kentucky-Japan Friendship Garden in the state. Enter through the Tokugawa gate, stroll the grounds planted with an abundance of native plants blended with Japanese garden principles, see the statuary and relax near the pond for quiet reflection. This is how you Zen in Georgetown.
Photo by Country Boy Brewing: Georgetown Taproom by Hannah Sither
3. Sip a craft beer at Country Boy Brewing’s Georgetown taproom – like their wildly popular Cougar Bait or Shotgun Wedding. “We don’t make Japanese beer, but our work ethos is very Japanese,” says Daniel “DH” Harrison, one of the “four Kentucky boys” (DH, Nathan Coppage, Jeff Beagle and Evan Coppage) who founded this award-winning brewery. Why? Because DH and Nathan both lived and taught in Tahara due to the sister city relationship, and it was in Tahara that they first got into craft beer. “The Japanese are known as extremely good craftsmen,” says DH. “We like to pay homage to the culture, the importance of quality and dedication to craft.”
Photo of The Galleries by Georgetown College
4. It might seem a stretch to include Georgetown College, but this college with its beautiful, stroll-worthy campus sends English instructors to Tahara and brings the world to Georgetown through its three art galleries. The Anne Wright Wilson Fine Arts Gallery and the Cochenour Gallery bring artwork by new, emerging or experimental artists from all over the world to the campus. The Jacobs Gallery collects and exhibits fine arts objects, including modern works and antiquities.
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