My kind of park!

Saturday after going to church and not seeing a veterinarian there that Rick met last year, we tracked her down at work. She was on emergency duty, and had been at the clinic since Friday afternoon caring for a horse that nearly died after surgery. She seemed to appreciate having a Sabbath diversion, and since her patient was stable, she suggested we cross the road to the Kentucky Horse Park to walk one of her favorite routes, the Rolex cross-country course.For some reason we never saw this part of the park when we were here two years ago. And this gorgeous outdoor venuewasn't even here two years ago! It was built for the 2010 World Equestrian Games, along with a huge indoor arena:As you can see, banners for the event are already up (click to biggify and read the words).

We didn't stay too long, since we were already planning to spend Sunday at the park. Brian was looking forward to seeing the International Museum of the Horse again - and I was looking forward to meeting another blogpal! Deb W had agreed to meet up with us at the Kentucky Horse Park - joking that since she knew what we looked like but we didn't know what she looked like, she could just "stalk" us for awhile. Maybe I should have been worried? Nah!Deb was just as sweet as I'd guessed her to be from our email correspondence, and we spent almost the whole day together.

This statue of the famous Arabian stallion *Bask++ is in the foyer of the International Museum of the Horse.
The place is full of all kinds of fascinating information on horses from around the world; unfortunately (just like last time) I didn't get to spend as much time with all the exhibits as I would have liked because a persistent little person kept calling, "Come on, Mom!" Until we got to this:A model train buff was setting up a holiday "toyland" display in the museum, and Brian was fascinated. I think he could have stayed in that spot all day!

But there were many other things to do and see at the park, so we moved on.Idyllic pastoral scenes treated our eyes as we moved from one display or exhibit to another. We also took in the American Saddlebred Museum which is on the grounds. I learned that this fancy show horse was originally called the Kentucky Saddler (I think Sara mentioned that on Friday, as well), along with all sorts of other fascinating history. Brian and I had to ride the Saddlebred "rocking horses," and Deb snapped our picture:(We also rode the coin-operated Morgan "horses" in the Morgan exhibit. Their trot and canter was much smoother and slower than the real thing. :-)

As another special day drew to a close, the light was just lovely. Even my little inexpensive Fuji camera was able to capture a bit of the magic in the distance (click to biggify):
We worked our way back to the entrance, and noticed these swans:We admired them while we lingered, unwilling to end the day. Internet friendships are fun, but pals in person are even better!

That's it for KY report #2 from . . .