After the morning news program this Sunday morning we felt the need to get out of the house and see something different. Where to? Anything but shopping, we both agreed! A little investigation and MainStrasse Village, in Covington, Kentucky, seemed like a good idea.
We took the long way around. Instead of driving straight south on i-75 or even diagonally on I-71, we took I-275, which runs in a circle all the way around Cincinnati--through Ohio, Kentucky, and Indiana. We drove first toward the east, and then eventually south and back west before crossing the Ohio River into Kentucky. After all, the objective was to see something new, and I had never been on this stretch of I-275 before, or at least so that I remembered it. We got off the highway shortly after crossing into Kentucky and set the GPS for Philadelphia Street in Covington, because though I could easily find Covington on the Cincinnati map, I could not read the fine print for Philadelphia Street.
Though we were already on the outskirts of Covington, Gladys Perry Smith (cousin of Gloria Pérez Sanchez, our GPS lady in Spain) sent us in a convoluted way back out and around Covington, the better to use the interstate highway rather than city roads, unfortunately. Nevertheless we arrived soon, just one exit south of the Ohio River. From there it was an easy two turns to the free parking lot of MainStrasse Village, which is a lovely neighborhood, larger than I had pictured, with unique house styles and interesting shops and restaurants. A nice and helpful gentleman taking a break outside the Magic Shop told us that not a lot would be open on Sunday, but that it was well worth strolling down a few blocks on Sixth Street until we got to Main Street. So that is what we did.
It was warm though not sunny, and by the time we came to the corner of Sixth and Main, we were ready for a bathroom break and a bite to eat. We stopped at the Cock & Bull Public House--not very German, we thought, but there were lots of people sitting at tables outside next to the Goose Girl fountain (inspired by the Grimms' fairy tale) but still with tables to spare. After our necessary visits inside we decided to join those outside--the air conditioning was too cold for us and it was not humid. It could have been really hard to choose from the beer menu--the Cock & Bull has 50 beers on tap!--but Carlsberg is one of them. We matched that up with a shared plate of two fish sliders, accompanied by "pub chips,"also described by our server as Saratoga chips. The fried fish was as good as I've ever had in England, and since it was a slider, I didn't feel guilty for eating too much,
While we ate and drank we browsed the two pieces of literature we had picked up at a sidewalk information center: one glossy brochure from the MainStrasse Association and another plain paper flyer depicting a MainStrasse Walking Tour, complete with an excellent map, architectural descriptions of 25 or so buildings, and a few pictures. The MainStrasse area stems from the 1840s, when German immigrants started arriving in Covington due to promotion of the similarities in typography between the Rhine River Valley and the Ohio River Valley. Most of the 800 buildings surviving today were built by the late 1870s, and though a large number are still residences, many have been converted into the restaurants and shops that make this an active urban entertainment district.
We walked around several blocks after our little lunch but did not do the full architectural tour. That will have to wait for another day, which may come a bit sooner than we had expected. Two people told us that, not surprisingly, MainStrasse has an excellent Oktoberfest each year. And one wisely informed us that it comes in September.
We also learned, from a card on the table at the Cock & Bull, that the MainStrasse pub is not unique. There are four in the Cincinnati area, and one, it turns out, is in our neighboring village, but in the village center, off the "beaten path" that we traverse frequently between towns. So now we have another place to explore.
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