The National Corvette Museum
If you are really into cars, especially fast cars, you won’t want to miss the National Corvette Museum in Bowling Green, Kentucky. The museum celebrates America’s Sports Car from its debut in 1953 to the present time. Bowling Green is also home to the world’s only General Motors corvette assembly plant. The assembly plant, KidsZone, and Cafe are currently closed to visitors due to coronavirus precautions, but there’s still lots to see at this cool museum.
The museum starts with the Nostalgia area and a walk down Main Street America to see the Corvette’s early history. All things Corvette are detailed in other museum sections including the history of Racing, Performance features, Design and Engineering concepts, as well as rotating exhibits. You can watch a preservation team perform everything from routine maintenance to restoration in the AutoZone area. There’s even a Corvette Nursery where owners can pick up their special-order cars…we saw two lucky couples getting their new baby!
The National Corvette Museum made international news headlines on Feb 12, 2014 when a sinkhole collapsed in the Skydome area in the early morning hours. The new Corvette Cave-In exhibit tells the story of what happened that day, why it happened, the cars that were affected, how the building was fixed, and much more. Tape marks on the floor indicate the cave-in area. There is even a mini-cave where you can experience a virtual simulation of the collapse.
The now-restored Skydome features an outline of the hole as well as the cave that lies beneath. Pace cars, all the generation models of the Corvette, and the world’s only 1983 Corvette (what??) are on display along with the Hall of Fame inductees.
Many current Corvette owners generously loan their cars to be on display at the museum. An Enthusiast area celebrates the Corvette lifestyle with trivia and memorabilia. Although Mike no longer has any of his corvettes, he was able to find some great souvenirs at the large Gift Shop. We even found the paver that our local Concho Valley Corvette Club in Texas donated to the museum. This is a fun stop for Corvette enthusiasts, but also has a lot of interesting facts about sinkholes and karst topography.
The Ark Encounter
From Bowling Green, we drove just a few hours north to Williamstown, Kentucky, to see the Ark Encounter. The sheer size of the structure amazed us when we first set eyes on this life-sized reconstruction of Noah’s Ark. It is the largest timber-frame structure in the world, built in part by Amish craftsmen from standing dead timber.
Committed to historical accuracy, the designers used the dimensions that God gave to Noah in the Bible. That said, they had to make the inside of the attraction one that people could safely visit and learn from. Even with the accommodations for visitors, the Ark Encounter still gives you a great feel for the giant boat as well as how Noah, his family, and the animals lived on it.
Three 7-story tower buildings anchor the ark and extend 14 feet into the ark structure. They contain elevators, stairs, and restrooms. They are designed to hold up under 120 mph winds and contain a 50,000-gallon underground water tank for extra fire protection.
So just how big is the ark?
Converting cubits to modern dimensions puts the ark at 510 feet long or nearly 1.5 football fields. It is 51 feet tall, or higher than a modern 4 story house. Two school buses placed end to end would fit inside its width of 85 feet. The inside storage capacity equals that of 450 semi-trailers! I had always tried to imagine what the ark would look like, so it was so incredible to actually walk through such an immense boat.
So how did all of the animals fit inside the ark?
In Genesis 6:20, the Bible says “of flying things after their kind, and of beasts after their kind, of every creeping thing of the earth after his kind, two of every sort shall come unto you to keep them alive.” An animal kind is a group of related animals not related to any other animals and is much broader than a species. This narrows the number of animal kinds aboard the ark to 1,398 and total animals to 6,744.
Many of these animals were likely smaller or younger animals that would take up less space, eat less and create less waste, and would have more time to reproduce after the flood. While far less than the number of species we have today, that’s still a lot of animals! (You can find a more in-depth explanation of all this here from AnswersinGenesis.org)
What was life like on the ark?
While no one knows exactly what Noah and his family looked like or how they lived inside of the ark, the designers present their artistic concepts based on clues from scripture and what is known of that time. Beautiful exhibits depict what their living areas might have been like and tasks that might have occupied their time during their year onboard the ark.
How did they take care of all the animals?
Noah and his 7 family members took care of all the animals on the ark: that means feeding, watering, and cleaning up after thousands of animals! Things like self-feeding troughs and using gravity to carry water through a pipe system would help them to work smarter, not harder. The informative displays show low-tech ideas for managing feeding, getting water, getting rid of waste, and even lighting that were available during that time. Attending to the needs of all the animals and themselves most likely took up a large portion of each day.
The spacious Ark Encounter park sits on 200 acres of land. Besides the ark itself, there are many other activities like a zoo, zip line, playground, and gift shop. There are several dining options to choose from and various presentations scheduled throughout the day.
I was particularly impressed with the parking area. Since we drove in the motorhome , we were guided to a separate large RV lot and then given a ride to the entrance in a golf cart. While the entrance fee is a little steep, you could spend the whole day here. We were also able to take advantage of an option to come after 1:00pm for a reduced fee with a meal included. This was one of my favorite places!
A few other places we visited in the area: Lost River Cave, Chaney’s Dairy Barn, Aviation Heritage Park, and the Creation Museum. Mammoth Cave National Park is also here, but many of the caves were closed so we decided to wait to visit later on.
Awesome journal of your travels. Especially exciting to see these 2 famous attractions described in such detail.
Safe travels
Hi David & Carol, We really enjoyed our time at both attractions. Thanks for following along with us!
Thanks for all the details on your adventures, love reading the info and looking at the photos.
See ya next month, stay safe.
Thanks, Pam. I look forward to seeing you soon!
WOW a Corvette dream come true! What a very cool place. That Ark is really something special and a little intimidating. Hopefully one day I can see it and experience it too. Thanks again for sharing such great travel adventures. Stay safe out there!
Thanks, Sandi. The Corvette Museum was very nice and Mike, of course, loved it. My favorite was the Ark Encounter because it gives life to something that we could only imagine before. I hope you will get to experience both one day!