Vacation Part Two: Urban Edition

A one-way trip from St. Joseph, Illinois to the Smoky Mountains in Tennessee is around 600 miles. Given that distance, my family had to stop and stay somewhere overnight on the way down (and back up). The two cities my family ended up stopping at (and exploring a little) were Louisville and Nashville. The following is a short summary of what I observed in each city.

 
Louisville

Louisville, Kentucky is a large city of around million people. Although my stay there was short, it was rather memorable. One of the nicest things about Louisville is its large public park on the Kentucky side of the Ohio River. The park is quite large, extending a few miles along the river. There are fountains and trails, but most notably a lot of plain open grassy space, making it a nice place to just sit down and relax. The coolest thing, however, is a mile-long pedestrian footbridge over the river. It's well-maintained, provides a beautiful view of the downtown, and serves as a cool physical and visual connection between Kentucky and Indiana. It was also a great place to snap some cool photos that I would forget to post on my Instagram.

The downtown of Louisville itself isn't quite as memorable, at least from what I saw. What struck me first is the smell- the city smelled plain awful. I'm not sure exactly why; perhaps it was the stench of rotting vegetation drifting over from the river. Regardless, it downgraded the Louisville experience quite a bit. Other than that, Louisville is your average American city. I'd best describe it as a discount Chicago. Tons of office buildings, restaurants, shops, just not as many as Chicago. And perhaps the restaurants aren’t at the same standard as Chicago’s. The one night we were in town, my family went to a place called "The Spaghetti Factory" thinking it was an old-style high-dining kind of place, but it turned out to be a chain restaurant that overcooked its spaghetti.

Nashville

On the way back, we stopped by Nashville, Tennessee. I'm not entirely sure how I feel about this city. At the very least, I'd say it is the most interesting city my family visited on this trip. There are distinctly different parts of town that each give their own vibe. The first part of downtown my family got to was what I'd describe as the old downtown, largely composed of sizable old buildings that weren’t quite skyscrapers. In some ways, it was kind of scary. It wasn't that it was dirty, dimly lit, or unmaintained- because it wasn’t. What took me aback was that there seemed to be a police officer present nearly every 100 feet on each block. This isn't even an exaggeration. I had never seen so many policemen standing around just to keep watch, even in the worse parts of downtown Chicago. However, once we exited that area, I didn't see any policemen.

The next “section” of Nashville is what I’d call the office district. There are many large corporations with huge glass skyscrapers in this area, namely AT&T. The impression I got from seeing this district is that Nashville is currently undergoing the process of rebuilding. Many of the corporate buildings looked as though they were built in the last five years, and many major roads in this area were being worked on. In my opinion, this was needed. Layout-wise, some parts of Nashville are the most unorganized I’ve ever seen, barely following the classic grid format.

The last district of Nashville is the bar and music scene, which is the one part of the city my dad wanted to see. If you like beer and loud country music, this part of Nashville is heaven. These two or three city blocks are filled exclusively with bars blasting country music nearly all the time. A lot of people were really into this, as the place was packed even during mid-afternoon on an average weekday. While I can understand the appeal, I wouldn’t say it’s exactly my idea of a cool hangout. Maybe when I’m 21, it will be.