The Cumberland Gap Tunnel on the border of Kentucky and Tennessee gave us the opportunity to travel under the storied Cumberland Gap today as part of a journey involving three states in about five minutes! We spent time at the Cumberland Gap Visitors Center learning a lot about the natural and human history of the area where in the 18th Century European settlers including Daniel Boon discovered paths long used by Native Americans to settle west of the Appalachian Mountains. From there we headed into Middlesboro in search of lunch and geocaches. At our first geocache site we didn’t find the cache but did learn that the valley in which Middlesboro sits was formed by a massive meteor. We lunched at The Avenue Cafe then let geocache searches take us to the Carnegie Library and on a walk through town before coming back to the Bell County Museum housed in their that library. Somehow Carnegie libraries always remind us of our own encounter at the one at Mirror Lake in October 1969!
Burgh House Hampstead
Off the beaten path is Hampstead is the more than three hundred year old Burgh House with a fascinating history. It’s now a community center, local museum, gallery, concert venue, event space, and more open to the public four days a week. We popped over for a bite to eat and to peruse the galleries to learn a little more about Hampstead history.
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