92 County Tour: Orange County

We decided that since our anniversary destination took us to a yet-unvisited-county, we would make our trip double as a county tour!

French Lick is in Orange County, Indiana, which sadly is not nearly as warm as the Orange County we all know by heart! It's almost directly south of where we live, but it's allllllllll the way at the bottom of the state! Orange County is not actually orange {though there are a lot of trees there that I imagine create a lovely similar hue in the fall!}. It got its name because many of the first people to settle there were Quakers who were fleeing slavery in Orange County, North Carolina.

There aren't any huge, famous cities in Orange county, but it's home to French Lick, with its history of mineral springs, casinos, wineries, and Larry Bird, and also the town of Paoli, which has a ski/tubing resort {that wasn't open yet when we were there}. There's also a lake there, and if we'd gone in the summer, you can know we would have visited that!

Here are some of the highlights of our visit to Orange County!

We toured {but did not stay at} the French Lick Resort. I am not a history buff at all, but I really enjoyed the tour we took. Our guide was great and knew his history well. He told us about the mineral springs in the olden days, and how people came there because they believed the water would heal everything under the sun. He also showed us all the amazing, ornate decorations and how when the Sheraton corporation took over the hotel several years ago, they ripped it all out and made it look like all the other Sheratons. It all had to be restored and redesigned later. I can't even imagine redoing and restoring all this kind of beauty:

 He also showed us these crawl space hallways that were originally used by hotel staff to transport carts of all sorts of hotel needs that they didn't want guests to have to see. Eventually these areas were turned into public halls, because everyone is so fascinated by the stone, and they wanted guests to be able to see it!

We also toured the other big hotel - the West Baden Springs hotel. We decided if we were ever independently wealthy enough to have a night at one of the hotels, this is the one we would pick - because the atrium is AMAZING.

Our same tour guide told us the story of this hotel and the ups and downs of its history throughout the years. He also took us through the gardens and showed us the locations of some of the mineral springs, though they are no longer accessible.

Fascinating stories!

We also visited the little town of Paoli, which has the most adorable courthouse:

They also had this old hotel for sale, and I told Ryan we should buy it and go all Chip and Joanna Gaines..

We shopped around in the little stores on their square, and that was fun, too! :)

Then we went to our coffee date for the county. The one we picked was called French Licks. It specializes in coffee and ice cream. See what they did there with the name???

 The menu - all cute on chalkboards.

 This particular coffee shop also featured a wood carving store, so there were wood carvings everywhere - including one of Larry Bird!

 They also had this huge buffalo, which Ryan wanted to sit on, despite the sign that said DO NOT TOUCH. Ha!

We didn't do any of their specialty drinks - just fresh brew and ice cream, but we enjoyed what we had! And we'd never shared a coffee shop with wood carvings before, so that was unique! {This was also where we played the game of checkers, where Ryan won by a lonnnnnnnnnnnnnnnng shot.

These are the non-Christmas-related highlights of the county; you saw all the rest in our anniversary posts!

Thanks for the fun weekend, Orange County! We enjoyed our visit and hope someday we can come back and enjoy the lake and the skiing. {That last part is just Ryan.}