The perfect two-lane blacktop winds through the gently rolling green hills in long graceful turnings as you follow the ribbon of road. Uphill and down, the road wanders through the land that billows like a green cloth flapping in the wind. Up more long hills and down more sweeping curves, the cycle humming beneath you as sunlight blinks on your face through the trees that line the road. Another white rail fence appears racing along beside you, a turf field stretching away beyond it. Magnificent horses dot the landscape, with a white-gabled barn in the distance and the outlines of a stately old house just visible in the trees beside it.
Roads just like this lace across the countryside of Kentucky’s Bluegrass Region, and Lexington, also known as “Thoroughbred City,” is located in heart of Bluegrass Country. The place has a genteel quality that is in keeping with the character and culture of the horse farms for which the region is known. Lexington is a beautiful city of 300,000, but it doesn’t seem that big. This is because, due to strict development guidelines put in place to protect the rural quality of the area, there is very little suburban sprawl around Lexington like you find in many cities. Take any old road out of the city center, and within a matter of ten or fifteen minutes you hit the open road, with rolling hills and farms in every direction.
However, before you leave town to find those perfect riding roads, check out some things to do in Lexington, which is easy to get around in, especially on a motorcycle. The downtown area is home to the University of Kentucky campus, where you can find the renowned Singletary Center for the Arts and the Anthropology Museum. Nearby is the Lexington History Center on East Main Street that is housed in a grand old building that was formerly the Fayette County Courthouse. There you can learn that Lexington is filled with all kinds of history going back to its founding in 1775, and that the town was once surrounded by a wooden palisade to protect it from Indian attack and an engagement of the Revolutionary War was fought there against British forces in 1782.
While in the downtown area, be sure to keep your eye open for one of the numerous festivals and events that are held almost every weekend through the spring and summer. There are artists fairs and farmers markets, and the neighborhoods adjacent to the UK campus are filled with cool bars and nice restaurants and shops to explore.
While in Lexington you have to check out the Kentucky Horse Park on the north side of town. The Park is about all things horse, with two museums: The International Museum of the Horse and the American Saddlebred Museum. There are campgrounds and guided trail rides, a gift shop and the Clubhouse Restaurant, and even a tour of the park on a horse-drawn trolley.
On the west side of town be sure to check out the Aviation Museum of Kentucky, near the Bluegrass Airport. This museum offers an interesting overview of the history of aviation, and has some very cool airplanes on display. The star of the collection is a replica of a Sellers Quadraplane, a four-winged airplane built by native Kentuckian Matthew Sellers in 1908. Also on display is an AH-1 Cobra attack helicopter, an F-14 Tomcat, an A4 Skyhawk retired from the Navy’s Blue Angels, and scale model replicas of the Wright Brother’s Flyer, NASA’s Lunar Lander and an RF-101 Voodoo supersonic reconnaissance plane.
After exploring all Lexington has to offer, it’s time to hit the roads around the area. The Bluegrass State has some of the most awesome roads for riding motorcycles; offering riders a host of scenic rides and places to explore. Head south out of town on Route 68 to Harrodsburg… and if you want to know what that is like, just read the first paragraph of this article again.
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