Happy Birthday Gary!

How would you like to start your birthday? Gary began his with a good run first thing in the morning. Taryn went along on her roller blades and that gave them both a chance to check this place out in the daylight.

Let's start off with the fact that it is incredibly beautiful here! We are staying in the middle of 1,200 acres of the most luscious green gently rolling hills in the very heart of Kentucky's famous Bluegrass region. The grounds of the Kentucky Horse Park are immaculate kept and there is so much to see and do - history, displays, museums, over 50 breeds of horses, a race track, stables, polo fields, and multiple event arenas of every type. Taryn is beside herself.

After his run Gary realized we would need transportation assistance here so he secured a golf cart for us to buzz around with to our hearts content. What fun it is to have that, and such a pleasant way to experience it all. We immediately went out to explore.

Our first stop was the Kentucky Horse Park Visitors Center. We wanted to know all there is to see and do here so we can wisely plan out our time. First priorities is to secure a horse ride for Taryn...but that did not turn out to be as easy as it sounds. There is a ride offered right from here, but as we checked it out we realized it was not the one for Taryn. So Gary embarked on a major search by phone to find one better suited for her.

There is also a tour of three local horse farms available and we wanted to get that set up for tomorrow. While Gary was working on making these arrangements he sent us to the gift shop. While we were there the most incredible rain storm hit. It was actually a deluge! My goodness, we had just driven our golf cart here in beautiful sunshine and now the sky was black and it looked like it could rain for a month! This was a bit discouraging to our immediate plans, but we decided to switch and do the indoor museums and exhibits now and save the outdoor things for tomorrow.

We enjoyed the Visitor Center displays and videos, and also the nearby Saddlebred Museum. By then the rain had thankfully passed, so we hopped in our golf cart and did some more exploring before going back to our "resort". We made dinner, did some much needed laundry while Taryn swam in their pool which is hands-down the best pool we've had this entire trip.

Gary and Taryn found out that there is a National Hunter Jumper Show and a Miniature Horse Show happening right here starting Thursday. Some of the horses started arriving tonight so we went back down to the massive stable area and watched the horses coming in.

After dark we came back to the bbow, made a small cake and enjoyed it with Gary's favorite cherry ice cream in honor of his birthday.