Earlier this year, struck by the quarantine and closure of so many places across the Bluegrass state, my husband and I took the leap and purchased a Side By Side. This gave us something fun to do all the while keeping us socially distanced from others. Because of that, we spent more time together and outside this year, than we ever have. Almost every weekend throughout the summer we loaded up a cooler full of drinks and snacks, and headed out to explore the mountains we call home. We saw some beautiful wildlife; elk, deer, wild horses, rabbits, squirrels, and even a coyote (my girls thought that was the coolest, and scariest) . My kids enjoyed doing our own little homemade scavenger hunts, and would be so excited when they would mark one of their animals or plants off their list.

Yesterday we took what may be our last family ride this year. It was beautiful weather, and we spent every daylight hour that we could exploring. If you have never been on a side by side ride through the Appalachian Mountains of Eastern Kentucky, PLEASE put it on your bucket list. Its worth the drive, it’s worth the money, it’s worth every second. Seeing a sunset from what some of our locals call the “top of the world” is pretty incredible. Check out some of my pics from our rides this year, most of them in Martin County Kentucky, our hometown and the highlight of the remainder of this blog post, but some are in surrounding counties.

You can drive, walk, or fly into Martin County at our Big Sandy Regional Airport in Debord. While your here you can check out all our local eateries. Some of my personal favorites in downtown Inez are the Shufflin’ Cafe, Dairy Drive In, Inez Dairy Bar, Pizza Stop/Cold Stop, Tres Hermanos Nunez and the Cloud 9 Cafe located next to the airport (we drove our side by sides through the mountains and ended up having dinner here in September, beautiful scenic drive and great food). During the summer you can check out Cassady’s BBQ and Shaved Ice, Tessa’s Tropical Sno or if you catch them during their scheduled rotation, you may find a local food truck, Hillbilly Hibachi. (Rumor has it we have an unrelated brick and mortar Hibachi restaurant coming to Inez very soon as well!) But if you want to get something familiar, we also have a Taco Bell/ KFC, Papa Johns, Subway, and Mcdonald’s for you. I’m sure I’m missing some, so you’ll just have to come see for yourself!

Martin County is often overlooked since US 23 bypasses right around us. Unless you have a reason to be here, you probably wont just happen upon Martin County. Were nestled between the mountains, often only making news for the negative things happening in our community. Its really a shame we aren’t known for having all the great things we do have. Great food, great scenery, great people, and plenty of locally owned shops and businesses on Main Street and beyond for starters.

When spring rolls back around, I intend on spending many weekends in these Martin County mountains again. Whether its mandated to stay away from the crowds or not, we kind of liked it that way. A simple life, with my husband and kids is all I’ve ever wanted. I’m proud to live in the mountains, I’m proud of this life we have, I’m proud of who we are, and I encourage everyone to visit our town, ride the backroads of these mountains and scream at the top of one at least once next year!