What to see in Louisville and Indianapolis?

[bork]

We're looking at a summer vacation and it looks like we'll have a couple days to spend in each city. What would be the must see things for mom, dad, and 5 year old son?

 

For Louisville, the Louisville Slugger Museum and the Frasier International History Museum look interesting.

And my son really wants to see the Indianapolis Children's Museum and the dinosaurs.

 

Any recommendations?

[Teatoe993]

If any of you are interested in cars, the Indy Speedway has a decent museum with a ton of old race cars. The AAA Ballpark looks really nice too. Haven't had the chance to take in a game when I'm in town though.

[pitchleague]

They used to do a tour at the Indy track, too, in which you go out on the track. They used to let you take your own car out on the track as well, but I don't know if they do that anymore. That was 20+ years ago--before lawsuits and stuff became the norm.

[theavrock]

I spent a night in Louisville. Its actually a pretty cool little town. We stayed at some hotel right on the river downtown for pretty cheap. We thought that the downtown was super fun to just walk around. We didn't do it with any kiddos though.

The Louisville Slugger museum for sure. If you like bourbon, I believe there were some places that you could tour. Not sure though. There is a cool little outdoor mall type place with lots of eateries. We ate out on the patio of some little place and it was all hustle and bustle but in an endearing way. Also there is some sort of Children's Museum kind of like Discovery World. Again, we didn't go because it was closed but it looked pretty fun.

[ttsather]

I don't know much about Indy, but Louisville also has Churchill Downs, and it's worth spending plenty of time checking out The Highlands which is an area full of little quirky shops and restaurants. The Bourbon Trail isn't far away and the distilleries can be very cool to visit.

 

As a non-parent I don't pretend to know what is or isn't feasible with a youngun, so I'll leave that to you.

[brewers4eric]

My wife and I spent a few days in Louisville with our kids in 2008, who were 3 and 1 at the time. The Louisville Zoo was one of our stops, and the zoo has recently added a small water park type play area. It was very crowded, but the kids had a blast playing there after seeing the animals. We stopped at Churchill Downs before our drive home. My daughter enjoyed looking at the horses in the staging area before each race, while my son was pretty much wiped out and slept on my shoulder the entire time that we were there, despite the crowds. There are also plenty of kid sized rides at Six Flags. Depending on the time of year, there is a big fireworks display called "Thunder over Louisville" that my sister raves about.