Navy Ball in French Lick

This weekend Paul and I were invited to the Navy Ball for Crane Naval Base, held at the French Lick Springs Hotel, about an hour and a half drive south from us. What the heck were we doing at a Naval Ball, you ask? Well, as part of Paul's job, he's supposed to hobnob with area businesses, and Crane Naval Base employs a lot of subcontractors and local small businesses. For me, it was a great excuse to get dressed up for a ball and have a much needed mini-vacation! Since I doubt many of our friends will ever have the chance to head out to French Lick, I'll give a bit of history about it.



French Lick Springs is an old hotel that used to be a therapeutic getaway for wealthy people to go bathe in and drink the spring water that flows out of the ground there. There's actually two hotels - one in West Baden, called the Carlsbad of America, a National Historic Landmark known for it's impressive round atrium. We actually stopped at the real Carlsbad (Karlovy Vary) in the Czech Republic on our honeymoon. Pretty much the only similarity I noticed was that both places have springs. Beyond that, Karlovy Vary is a fancy, built-up city with lots of shopping and charming restaurants. It's also home to Becherovka, a delicious Czech herbal liqueur. French Lick and West Baden, on the other hand, outside of the hotels, have Denny's and a CVS and windy back roads. There is the French Lick Winery that makes sweet regional wines, though I can't say we were inspired to bring any home. The hotels had become quite dilapidated over the years, and several years ago Bill & Gayle Cook, owners of the local Cook Medical company, donated over $500 million to renovate the hotels. So they're pretty darn nice now!

We tried to get into the West Baden Hotel to check out the dome, but it was closed for a private event until Sunday afternoon.


But, the French Lick Springs Hotel has its own nice features. Here's the casino:


And the renovated lobby


And the Grand Colonnade Restaurant, which is probably the fanciest buffet setting I've ever seen


Here's the back courtyard.




And, of course, the "World Famous Pluto Spring" itself. I was glad I had been to Karlovy Vary so that I knew that the rotten egg smell was supposed to be there from the sulfurous spring water.


And in case you were wondering for what reason someone would partake of rotten egg-smelling water, here's Paul posing with the promotional message, "America's Greatest Laxative"


As for the Ball itself... I loved the floral arrangements - they had little LED lights in them so they glowed as it got dark


It started out with the important people being announced and going to the head table. These included high-up officers of the Navy, and people like the Lieutenant Governor. Here's the flag procession which preceded the National Anthem


After a bunch of speeches by a few different high-ups about this celebration of the Navy's birthday and a recounting of the many humanitarian efforts put on by the Navy (eg, medical care in Haiti, Pakistan, etc following natural disasters, among other things), they had a special ceremony for Prisoners of War. It was a really moving event. They had a table set up with one chair, and said how it was to represent that that the POWs are alone. Then they lit a candle to symbolize the strength of our POWs to stand up to their oppressors, and a red rose to symbolize the family waiting for them, and so forth. It really makes you stop and think about the sacrifices our armed services are making right now for our country. At the end of the speeches, they had the official cake cutting. I believe they had the newest Navy member present a sword to the most senior member, and together they cut the cake. (You can see the table-for-one on the right side of the picture)


Here we are at the table


After dinner, they had a live band and dancing. Before we turned in for the night, we hit up the casino with the $5 credits they gave us at the front desk when we checked in. We each got a free t-shirt and headed in for the slots. I wound up with a cool $3.75 in my pocket that I didn't have when I went in there, so that was pretty nice. I won't disclose Paul's outcome.


As we left the next morning, I noticed a high roller was visiting the casino. Check out that detail work!


Finally, here's a few scenes from our drive back to Bloomington.
This is where your grain get stored before it gets packed and put on grocery store shelves or fed to animals.


There are a lot of falling-down old barns around Indiana

Many people in Southern Indiana have farm animals


Here's a farm in Loogootee (which is where we got our former puppy, Rewley)


And we made a quick stop in Amish Country


They're great bakers - we got a huge thing of cinnamon buns - yum!


Just watch out for buggies!