The reason we went this way, and stayed outside of Cincinnati, is because we wanted to go to the Creation Museum and the Ark.
Selfie #2: At the Creation Museum, Petersburg KY
Look, a dinosaur!
In the lobby area of the museum is an exhibit about dragon legends.
Probably the most universal dragon story (in Western culture) is St. George and the dragon.
Also in the lobby are early man and some sort of raptors.
Okay.
Finch butt.
The first part of this is true. Up to your beliefs about the second part.
Little non-poison dart frog.
Dinosaur fossil.
Mom and the dinosaur.
So in Man's world, apes and humans have a common ancestor. In God's world, ape and humans were created separately, and all modern apes are derived from the proto-ape that was taken on the ark.
Paul, writing his letters to the gentiles.
I don't understand how these prophecies relate to the events that are being claimed as the fulfillment of those prophecies. Especially the Alexander the Great one.
Uh, then there was this bit, about everything falling apart because people aren't believing in the bible anymore. It was a little strange.
The beginning of the museum kind of bounced around in topic.
Here is where it starts to settle into the history of the world.
We begin with Creation.
In case you wanted to know what the animals ate in God's world.
Adam and Eve and the Snake. Apparently they were in a lagoon.
From Creation we go to Corruption.
Things have gotten weird again.
...Tornados?
Also, apparently some of the animals stop being vegetarians.
The raptor moved and screeched. You are not supposed to pet it.
Ah, hence tornados. Apparently.
Cabbages!
Incest used to be totally fine as long as you were married. Because of reasons.
Now we have Catastrophe.
We're going to the Ark after this.
Apparently it's only the beginning of a massive bible themed amusement park.
Cross-sectional model of the ark.
Mini model of animals being loaded onto the ark.
Giraffes and dinosaurs and seven sheep (should be pairs), because they were clean. I guess giraffes and dinosaurs are unclean animals.
What's a flood diorama without tigers eating the sinful people?
Animals in the ark.
An now for some "informational" displays:
Oh good, we've gotten to Confusion, which is where I have been for awhile.
Because there has been a lot of signage, here's the beginning of the era of Confusion.
FYI: Japheth, Shem, and Ham were Noah's sons.
They went off to start the Europeans, Asians, and Africans respectively according to God's world.
I feel like they ran out of steam for the last three C's (these go right to left in order). To be fair, it's the Creation museum, not the Christ, Cross, Consummation museum.
The seven C's.
And then there was a guy with a ball python.
So we both held it.
Okay, now that we've learned about creation, let's go see the ark!
We found the parking lot and took a trolley to get down to the ark. So far it's the only part of the future super bible land that exists.
The ark is....massive. This view is me standing under the side and looking up.
Along the ark.
It was cold, and few people were here, but it's set up to have ridiculously long lines.
You can see all the stanchions set up under the ark here.
The inscription says:
"On the very same day, Noah, his wife, his sons, and his sons' wives entered the ark. The livestock, every beast, every winged creature, every creeping thing in which is the breath of life went into the ark two by two. Genesis 7:11,13-15"
Selfie #3: The Ark Encounter, Williamstown KY
Upon entering the ark, you see this and here generic animal sounds. These are small animal pens.
There are many of them, and also amphorae of feed and water.
I think this is the bow side of the ark.
I found Noah's family!
I also found a blob animal.
Bigger animal pens.
Bigger animals mean bigger water jugs.
85 kinds of dinosaurs.
Where did they get all this giant lumber from?
Here's a full cross-section model of the ark.
Neat cascading structure.
The days of creation.
This photo is blurry. It's not you. Music is part of descent into darkness.
And even larger animal pens.
Soooo much wood.
The upper walkways are so they could feed the animals more efficiently.
Noah basically took all the proto-animals on the ark, and then all of the similar animals are derived from that proto-animal. In this example, the proto-wolf.
Giant sloths!
Noah's library.
Mom in the library.
Noah's workshop. Noah was around 500 years old when the flood happened, so obviously he had time to become a skilled carpenter and blacksmith.
Oh, this is cute. Is this for kids?
That's a little harsh.
Ah. It's all about how cutesy stories aren't good for the severity of the flood story.
Oh good, there's a mini petting zoo with an alpaca.
The main ramp up and down to get to the different levels of the ark. I think there were four.
We were headed up to the living quarters.
Japheth and Rayneh, who created the Europeans.
Shem and Ar'yel, who created the Asians.
Ham and Kezia, who created the Africans. They must be out feeding the animals.
It's hard to tell from the photos, but they REALLY pushed the Europe, Asia, Africa angel in the smaller details.
Produce and hanging gardens.
Grain and dry good storage.
Noah and the dove. Noah repeatedly sent out a dove to see if the flood was over.
It finally came back one day with an olive leaf. It can't be that it found one of the flotillas of trees that are supposed to be around, right?
I feel like we're back to the evolution vs creation trees.
Non-creationist science says that the population from 8,000 BC to 1AD grew at a rate of under 0.05% per year. Now you don't have to look it up.
A map of all the flood stories in native beliefs/folklore/etc.
The ark, as designed by the Borg, or as sort of depicted in the Epic of Gilgamesh.
In case you forgot how massive this thing is.
London Polyglot Bible leaf in Chaldean, Hebrew, Greek, Syriac, Arabic, and Latin (1655)
Psalms in Greek on papyrus (late AD 200s)
AKA a map of large cities in North America.
Again, really really massive.
Guest appearance by the moon.
Selfie #4: The End of the Ark Encounter, Williamstown KY
Overall there was a lot of thought and care, time and effort, put into both the Creation museum and the ark. It has great production values. The problem for me is, I do not buy into the premise on which all of it is based. So I enjoyed it, but it was more like going to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. I got to visit someone else's world for a little bit and that was kind of neat.
Also, if you had any misgivings about these being solely for religious education or whatever, remember that the ark is only the beginning of a planned huge theme park and the Creation museum also had a petting zoo, zip lines, botanical garden, and more.
Also, if you had any misgivings about these being solely for religious education or whatever, remember that the ark is only the beginning of a planned huge theme park and the Creation museum also had a petting zoo, zip lines, botanical garden, and more.
We left the ark and planned to get to St. Louis for the night. When we got to St. Louis, Mom wasn't tired of driving, so we kept going and ended up in Columbia, MO.
New States: 3 (Indiana, Illinois, and Missouri) - Total States: 8
Today's Miles: 511 - Total Miles:970.7
This concludes our adventures for today.
