Procrastination got the better of me this year so our Spring Break needed to be within driving distance of our home in West Michigan. About the maximum amount of travel time I can stand in a car is 10 hours. Luckily the Red River Gorge was well within my comfort zone! I’ve had my eyes on underground kayaking for a number of years, and this provided a good opportunity to go check it out.
Travel Day:
We had five full days to for our vacation. When I plan road trips, I generally plan a little extra time for bathroom breaks and point of interest stops. So, for this trip I planned three full days of adventures!
The first day was just driving to get to Kentucky. Since we were going through Lexington, we HAD to plan a stop at the Kentucky Horse Park for my horse-loving daughter. We stayed in Georgetown, just north of the Kentucky Horse Park and booked a hotel with a pool for her to spend the evening in.
DAY ONE:
We got up and visited the Kentucky Horse Park when they opened at 9am. We had plenty of time to tour around the grounds and visit the various barns including the Police Barn, Breeds Barn and the Big Barn. We arrived just in time for the Hall of Champions presentation where we met famous horses like Roy H.
We finished up at the KHP just before lunch. The Red River Gorge is about another hour south from Lexington, so we stopped for McDonalds because that was our daughter’s special request š Just like all of our other trips, I had planned to pick up a grocery order from Walmart on our way out of town. After our trunk was full of water, snacks and microwavable popcorn, we were on the road to the Red River Gorge!
Our First stop was to visit the Natural Bridge. We chose to take the Rock Garden Trail to Natural Bridge and go down Devil’s Gulch on the way back (2.6 miles). Okay, so that was the plan – but that is NOT how things happened. If you don’t know already, I am the primary navigator when we’re on vacation. My husband sort of just lifts the heavy things and drives the car. I also have type 1 Diabetes. Something to know about Type 1 Diabetics is our brains get quite foggy when we have a low blood sugar.
So, for our very first hike, I took us in the wrong direction. Side note: I chose to start my hike with a stable blood sugar, but quickly dropped low. It takes about 20 minutes to feel “normal” while recovering from a low. Anyway, we ended up going UP Devil’s Gulch. It was a bit more strenuous than going the other direction, but because of the rocks being slippery, I am secretly happy we made this mistake.
We made it to the top in one piece and then headed toward the Natural Bridge. The trail we were on crossed paths with the SkyLift, and we felt an irresistible urge to ride it down to the gift shop. All three of us squeezed into one seat and rode the chair lift to the bottom. We purchased a slice of fudge to snack on and hitched a ride back up to the top to continue our hike.
The SkyLift has it’s own parking lot, so you can absolutely complete your hike and come back to do the lift ride later.
After getting off the SkyLift, we continued our hike to the Natural Bridge. Since we were going backwards, we walked across the bridge first, and then went below it. There were large groups of people, so although we felt like we were going “the wrong way” it was kind of nice to not get stuck in such a big crowd. Because we went up Devil’s Gulch, the majority of our uphill portion of the hike was behind us so the remainder of our hike was mostly downhill.
Instead of heading straight back to the car, we took the Rock Garden Trail all the way around, under the chair lift track and into a wonderfully green and moss covered section of trail before reaching the car. Although everywhere else was crowded, we only saw one other pair of hikers in this section of trail.
Next we stopped near the Lakeside Trail head (just around the corner from the Natural Bridge Trailhead) to check out the swinging bridge and see if we could visit the Nature Gift Shop. Unfortunately, the gift shop was not open, but watching our daughter run back and forth across the bridge was entertaining!
By then it was about 4:00 and we wanted to get checked into the hotel and get our groceries put away before getting too deep into other adventures. After we had the car unpacked, a huge helping of ramen noodles sounded too good to leave behind. So, we all warmed up our cups of noodles and ate a sandwich before heading over to the Sky Bridge Trail.
Most of the hikes at the Red River Gorge are located on the same gravel road, and the Sky Bridge is near the middle of it. The drive is about 20 minutes long to get to the middle, but we went for it anyway because we knew this particular hike is very popular. Our hope was that getting there near sunset would cut down on the crowds of people. We were so thankful to be right! We were the only ones there š
After hanging out for a little while, we started back to the car. In the bushes somewhere nearby we heard the “huffs” of warning from a bear that we startled on our way out. We steadied our pace and talked loudly to the bear while keeping calm. The bear must have decided that we were scary because we never did get to see it. Just be cautious about wildlife when you’re in their home – especially if you’re hiking at dawn or dusk!
DAY TWO:
At 9:30 the next morning we headed to The Gorge Underground Kayak Tours. Procrastination struck once again and there were no available times for us to do the “deluxe tour.” However, we were lucky enough to get some tickets for the classic tour which was still very cool! The staff is super friendly, well informed, and kayaking underground is a pretty cool experience!
After kayaking, we drove around to visit the Nada Tunnel. It was a much longer tunnel than I imagined and the amount of traffic going through there was surprising.
Next was a stop at Miguel’s Pizza for lunch. I was pleasantly surprised at how fast they were able to serve us given the amount of people there eating lunch. The pizza was excellent and our daughter (who is not a pizza fan) loved the alfredo noodles š
The next hike for the day was to Gray’s Arch (2.3 miles). This was a fairly easy hike that the whole family was able to enjoy. It was a little crowded when we got to the arch, but we expected that, being the middle of the day and how easy the hike was.
After filling up on some snacks, we headed out to hike the Auxier Ridge to Courthouse Rock Trail. This hike was over 4 miles long. Some of the views at the end were really spectacular, but to be honest, I liked the hike around Rock Garden the day before a little better. There was a bridge-like section right before Courthouse Rock that made us all feel very small š
DAY THREE:
The forecast for the day said rain, rain, rain.
I started to bum out a little because a solid day of rain didn’t sound like too much fun. However, this turned out to be one of the best days we had during this trip. We started by having breakfast and coffee at the Daniel Boone Coffee Shop and jumped around at the local gift shops. At 12:30, we went to Out The Top Adventures for a guided UTV tour.
All morning I was crossing my fingers that the rain would magically disappear and I’m SO glad it didn’t. The trails were wet, muddy and slippery. Our UTV tour was excellent and definitely one of our favorite parts of the whole trip.
The guides were friendly, funny and kept everyone’s safety in mind while still making our trip entertaining.
After we got back to the hotel and changed out of our wet and muddy clothes, we couldn’t convince our daughter to commit to any hikes while it was raining. So, we had a lazy afternoon in the hotel. Usually, days like this drive me crazy. I’m one of those weird humans that can’t sit still. Especially on vacation, sitting inside while I know there are things outside makes my skin crawl. It didn’t take long and we all fell asleep watching a movie š
I woke up to raindrops still tapping on the window. When I checked the radar I found that we would have a solid hour right before sunset to squeeze in a couple of short hikes! I had a silent celebration while I put my boots back on encouraged the family to jump back in the car for one more round of adventures.
Angel Windows was on our way and is only a half-mile hike. We stopped here on our way to the Rock Bridge Trailhead and it was a nice way to wake us back up!
Finally, we hiked the Rock Bridge Trail to Creation Falls (1.4 miles) which was magical after the rain stopped. The sun sinking lower in the sky lit up the raindrops and made the entire forest glow. The waterfall was misty, the forest was quiet. It was a wonderful way to end our stay at the Red River Gorge!
If you’re looking for a condensed version of our itinerary, here it is! I hope you find this information helpful when you’re planning your next vacation!
DAY ONE:
- 9am – Kentucky Horse Park (Hall of Champions Presentation @11am)
- 12pm Pick up Walmart grocery order in Lexington
- 1 hour drive to Red River Gorge Area / lunch
- Natural Bridge Via Rock Garden Trail with Devils Gulch (2.6 miles)
- Sky Lift
- Nature Gift Shop and Suspension Bridge
- Sky Bridge Trail (0.6 miles)
DAY TWO:
- 9:30am arrive 30 minutes before 10am Underground Kayak Tour
- Nada Tunnel
- Miguel’s Pizza for lunch
- Gray’s Arch (2.3 miles)
- Auxier Ridge Trail to Courthouse Rock (4.2 miles) You can take the Courthouse rock loop ad add a half mile to this.
DAY THREE:
- Breakfast at Daniel Boone’s Coffee Shop
- Gift shops/ souvenier shopping
- 12pm – arrive 30 minutes prior to Out The Top UTV tours. Ride at 12:30
- Hike Angel Windows (0.5 miles)
- Creation Falls via Rock Bridge Trail (1.4 miles)
There are a few hikes that I wish we would have had more time for, but this was a good amount for our daughter’s hiking tolerance. There are various other short hikes to places like Whistling Arch (. 5 miles), Princess Arch Trail (.6) and Half Moon Arch (.8 miles) that I think we could have made time for. After the arches that we did see, I think my husband was more interested in seeing other things. The Pinch ’em Tight trail was one that makes me sad to miss, so let me know if that is one we should go back for!