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It’s Sunday and we finally made it into Ohio for the first time (technically, we might have been in Ohio when the ferry made landfall the other night, but I’m not sure).  We visited the Krohn conservatory in Eden park, a must-see if you are visiting Cincinnati.  The conservatory has a stunning garden of tropicals with an indoor waterfall as well as several other lush indoor gardens.

Too bad grandma was in a class all day; she would have certainly loved to see this.

As an extra bonus, while we were there, we saw the special “butterflies of Japan” exhibit.  After visiting the children’s craft area (where we made this butterfly mask), GC and I went into a section of the conservatory where there were thousands and thousands of butterflies flying freely about.  Truly a stunning display.

Several of them would alight on our fingers and shoulders.  GC was captivated.  If you go, go early; we arrived shortly after opening, and it was fairly crowded already. it was queuing up by the time we left.

After we left the conservatory, we drove around the park to the river outlook.  At this point you can really see how the river has cut its valley out of the rock.   Grandpa found this interesting.  GC found it more interesting that you can also see a lot of ducks in the nearby pond.  After chasing the ducks around for about fifteen minutes, we left the park and tried to find the children’s museum.  It is not intuitively obvious how to get to the museum from the park and I was certainly glad that we were driving around on Sunday afternoon and not trying to dodge weekday traffic.  I also determined that as nice a place as Cincinnati is to visit in the summer, I would not want to have to navigate those hills in the winter.

We did eventually find the museum center; it is carved out of the old Union Station, and makes an impressive sight as you drive up to it.  Unfortunately, when we arrived, grandpa discovered that he had left all his money in his other pants back in the hotel room.  GC took it well, and patiently endured the trip back into Kentucky, to the hotel, and back to the museum.

There are several museums in the old train terminal; we only did the Children’s.  That was enough.  I don’t know if GC learned much, but she certainly had a lot of fun. There was the water works (like the one in Louisville), and there was a huge jungle gym-like area made up like a series of tree houses in the woods (it was called “The Woods”).

Up and down and through tunnels and slides it went on for about an hour.  There was one minor crisis when GC would not come down from the top level because she had lost one of her shoes.  Eventually, though, the shoe was found, and the crisis passed.

On the way out of the museum, we had this souvenir photo made.

Outside the Aquarium

Now, this morning we all headed into Newport, Kentucky, just across the river from Cincinnati proper to visit the famed Newport Aquarium.  The Aquarium is not cheap, but it is quite an engineering feat.

We saw a lot of fish.  A lot.  We also saw eels, and a giant octopus, and we visited the frog bog where we made a lot of frog sounds.  The jellyfish room was the most fascinating to grandpa, although GC wasn’t very impressed.  We fed the lorikeets in the rainforest exhibit (Lorikeets?  In an aquarium?  Bear in mind that they get an extra $2 out of you.) The “World rivers” exhibit showed a variety of fish from all over the world (the Mekong was particularly interesting).

The Amazon river exhibit is a thirty-foot long tunnel inside of a 117,000 gallon tank that allows the fish to glide so closely and clearly that you think you can just reach out and grab them.  But the high point of the aquarium is the eighty-five foot tunnel through 185,000 gallons of water filled with sharks, rays, and reef fish.  Here we saw sharks as close as we would ever want to and maybe even closer.  After you leave the shark tank, you can visit a little “petting tank” where you can pet small sharks as they swim by.  Finally, there is the penguin exhibit, which makes all the kids laugh.  It is sponsored by Kroger (which is headquartered in Cincinnati).  While we were watching the penguins dart around, what I suppose you would call the penguin pen maintenance person came out to spray the guano off the rocks.  “Four years of studying zoology,” I thought, “on your way to your Masters degree, and this is what you get to do all summer.”

The "Frog Bog"

I don’t know that the aquarium is the kind of place that you would want to visit every year, but it’s worth at least one trip if you’re in the Cincinnati area.

After lunch, we drove down to Rabbit Hash, Kentucky.  We had seen it featured on “Kentucky Life” (our favorite TV show), but I have to say that a trip to Rabbit Hash is more about the journey than the destination.  It is a pretty drive through the rural hills and dales of the Ohio River valley and you do end up at the Rabbit Hash general store.  The store is an old-fashioned conglomeration of everyday items and old junk, but it is all reasonably priced.

GC and Biker

On the way back, we drove right by the Creation Museum; it was only about ten minutes from the hotel, but we did not stop.

Atrium Fountain

Today we drove up to Erlanger, Kentucky, a suburb of Cincinnati, best known for where the Cincinnati airport is.  Grandma was attending a convention there, and the grandchild and I went along for the ride to have a good time.  We stayed at the Airport Holiday Inn.

GC was quite impressed by the fountain in the atrium.  Everytime we left the room we had to walk by the fountain and look at it.  She also enjoyed the pool on multiple occasions, although of course there was no snow on the ground outside while we were there.  In fact, the landscaping and surrounding terrain were all quite attractive.

Grandma, grandpa, and GC went to the Louisville Science Center today, or as GC likes to refer to it, The Eyeball Museum (a reference to part of the museum’s logo).  We visited the robot exhibit, saw examples of Kentucky wildlife habitats, played macrophages and T-cells attempting to kill invading bacteria, worked an air compressor, and many other activities.  At the emergency room, GC donned a doctor’s cape, inspected grandpa’s x-rays, and to everyone’s relief, pronounced him OK.  We wandered around about three hours and there are still parts of the museum that we haven’t seen.

GC1 and the neighbors

We left the museum for lunch and went down the road to a Louisville icon, the Kingfish.  The first Kingfish restuarant opened in 1948; we went to the 1976 version, which is right on the Ohio River.  We saw humongous (according to the GC) barges, sailboats, little boats, and a police boat go by while we were eating.

When we returned home, the neighbor was giving his young daughter a wagon ride, and offered GC one, too.  A wagon ride is always a good thing.

Helping in the kitchen

For dinner, grandpa grilled Kentucky brats, buffalo steak, pork chops and corn-on-the-cob.  GC helped pick Swiss Chard from the garden and cook it up on the stove.

GC and I were sitting at the dining table.  The day’s mail had recently arrived, including this week’s edition of The New Yorker.  The cover of the magazine featured a cartoon showing various characters wandering through Union Square.  We discussed what each character might be doing, counted the number of boys and girls and birds; generally, the sort of thing you’d do with a four-year old.  Grandma entered the room.

“It figures,” she said, “Her father said this would probably happen.”

“What?” I replied.  (I reply that a lot to my wife.)

“He figured you’d be reading the New Yorker to her.”

GC1 and I walked across the street to the fancy nursery today, and she was captivated by the sight of all the blooms – roses, hydrangeas, dahlias, and a bunch of other stuff that I can’t even begin to identify, even though we have some of them in our front yard.  That trip was good for half an hour all by itself.

In the afternoon we headed over to Indiana for a birthday party.  The trip was uneventful until we arrived at the birthday girl’s house and there was no one there.  I had a few anxious moments wondering how I was going to poop a birthday party before I noticed a note on the door stating that there had been a change of venue and giving directions to the new party location.

The Waterpillar is unwrapped

The party was a blast.  As promised, one of the gifts was a “wiggling waterpillar”, a lawn toy that sprays water in various directions and the kids run around it.  There were several other presents, of course, and GC, no doubt caught up in the excitement of the moment, helped the birthday girl unwrap and show them off.  There were hot dogs and soap bubbles and balloons and cake and everything you need for a perfect birthday party.

Then of course came the dreaded writing of the thank you note.

The Thrill of Discovery

Vicarious birthday joy

Last Saturday, Grandchild 1’s parents dropped her off for the summer.  It has been a whirlwind of activity since, and promises to be for the next couple of months!

Sunday, while the four females (grandma, mom, GC1, & GC2) slept in, GC’s dad and I went off on a three and a half hour bicycle ride.  We returned only to find that the females had since arisen and decided that we were going to spend the rest of the day at Huber’s.  “Huber’s” is considered an annual rite for the locals; they make a pilgrimage there with the family.  GC1 rode a tractor-pulled trailer out into the strawberry fields and picked strawberries (I have mentioned before that the Hubers are geniuses at getting city folk to do things for free that they used to have pay hired help to accomplish).  We went and looked at the rabbit family.  We slid down the slide.  We fed the goats corn (they have an interesting setup where you load corn kernels into a cup and then crank a wheel which runs carries the cup to a jungle-gym-like structure that the goats have climbed to the top of and are awaiting the arrival of your corn).  We put bits of hot dog on fishing hooks and caught a small catfish in their pond.  That was just the first Huber’s.  Then we went on to the second Huber’s, where we visited the ice cream shop (shown), the winery, and the bakery (I got a rhubarb pie).  Then it was off to the kiddie park.  Once again, GC1 passed up the calf, the pony, and the sheep to get to the goats and feed them corn.  She seems to have a thing for goats.  We gobbled at the turkeys, listened to the peacocks screech, slid down another slide and then plunged into the bamboo maze.

I really enjoyed the bamboo maze.  GC1 and I got lost, causing grandma some concern, but we eventually found our way into the center of the maze where the flag was.  The rest of the family stood outside the maze and yelled at us to get out of it, which of course was not of much help at all.  Eventually dad found us and led us to the exit.  I found it great fun.  The others were rather less enthused.

Tuesday grandma and GC baked a chocolate cake together – from scratch!  Nothing out of a box, not even the frosting.  It was absolutely delicious.

Wednesday afternoon we headed downtown to the sprayground by the river.  Unfortunately I could not remember exactly which parking lot was the correct one.  I picked the wrong one.  After walking around in the hot (it was nearly ninety) sun for about fifteen minutes, GC1 was not a happy camper.  However, we got back in the truck, found the right lot, and as soon as she saw the water shooting up and all the little kids running around in swimsuits, it was declared “the best day ever!”  Spraygrounds are really a pretty neat idea; I don’t think teenagers find them much fun, so it’s all little kids, it’s reasonably easy to keep an eye on yours, and they save tax money – no lifeguards and the liability insurance has got to be cheaper.  The one downtown is particularly well-architected.

Backyard view with fence and tree

Front view with columned portico

Today we built a house with her building blocks.  It turned out very nicely, with a columned portico, outdoor accent lights, and a classical pediment.  Much cooler than Lincoln Logs.

Once that project was complete, it was off to the local library. GC played with the wooden train set there for a while until a slightly older child came in and started surfing the internet. At that point the wooden train could simply not compete with www.barbie.com.

Splashing at the sprayground

After the library it was off to the sprayground again, but this time the smaller one in our neighborhood.

"Sprayground"

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