Ark Encounter

 The Ark Encounter is a Noah's Ark-themed attraction that opened in July of this year.  It is located a short distance from the family farm in Kentucky, so we decided to check it out.  Because the park is brand-new, there are still some organizational issues.  We visited on a holiday, and you could tell they were still working out the kinks of managing large crowds.  Fortunately we did not have to wait in the extremely long line to buy tickets because we purchased ours online.

What I liked about the Ark is that it was built to the dimensions as specified in the Bible.  This allowed me to actually experience the wonder that the Ark was.  Of course, no one knows exactly what the interior of the Ark looked like or what life on the Ark was like. Some artistic liberties were taken with the inside portion of the Ark, but I was okay with those.

I should mention that as of now, this is a straight-up tourist attraction.  I mean, there's an add-on where you can go zip-lining or ride a camel.  I was not moved spiritually by the attraction at all, but I don't think it was designed to do that.  If it were, there would have been a chapel or a minister on hand or something.  I appreciated it for what it was, but it is definitely not a place that I would plan a spiritual pilgrimage to or anything.

Most of the exhibits inside of the ark consisted of large signs explaining the events from creation, leading up to the ark, and then what happened afterwards.  The signs were beautiful, but there were so many people on the ark that it took a while to get up to them.  Then, once I did I felt like if I stopped to read it that I would be holding up everyone behind me.  So, I just took pictures of all of the signs that I will read at a later date. 

Okay- here's the part that was surprising.  There were all of these cages on the ark with animatronic animals in them.  There were the usual bear, pig, rodent-type animals, but there was also a section with animatronic dinousaurs.  The claim is that dinos were on the ark.  I had always assumed that this was not the case, so I was a bit surprised to find them here.  There were signs explaining the claim of dinosaurs being on the ark, and I took pictures of them all, but I have not had the opportunity to investigate this yet.  Overall, I enjoyed the trip to the Ark Encounter.  I would not make a special trip to get here, but not a bad way to spend a few hours if in the area.