Things To Do In Bedford
Kenny Wallace Dirt Racing Experience
3-Lap Ride-Along or 10- or 15-Lap Driving Session with Kenny Wallace Dirt Racing Experience (Up to 55% Off)
Ride along with a dirt-track driver or take the wheel for a 10- or 15-lap experience in a Dirt Late Model car
Bloomington Speedway
$129 $64
Select Local Merchants
For eight years, the husband-and-wife team at Carousel Winery has cultivated the vines of their family farm into a collection of award-winning wines. On Saturday, August 6, Marion and Sue Wilson will throw a party at Carousel's six-acre winery to celebrate its continued success as attendees sample flights of reds and whites, try out descriptors such as "oaky" and "four," bite on BBQ ribs and chicken, and show off complimentary Carousel glasses. Throughout the afternoon, enjoy a variety of events and prizes devoted to the number eight, such as a Crazy Eights card tournament with an $88.88 gift certificate prize and eight door-prize drawings for $8.88 gift certificates. From 2 p.m. to 6 p.m., the sultry voice of Charlene Blay leads her four-piece jazz ensemble, The 2nd Editions through 5/8 time signatures and various deconstructions of the Scooby Doo theme song.
Stretching across more than a thousand acres at the foot of southern Indiana's Hoosier National Forest, Wilstem Ranch's rolling farmland is home to creeks, caves, natural-rock outcroppings, and more than 30 miles of woodland trails, marking it as an ideal family escape. A creek populated by small-mouth bass attracts local fishermen; wildflowers, native plants, and trees color the historic landscape in natural vegetation. Additionally, a variety of cabins?equipped with kitchens, hot tubs, and fireplaces?provide cozy accommodations year-round.
Then there's the zip lines. Tours send thrill-seekers flying across 4,000 feet of French Lick woodlands, experiencing unparalleled views and leaving squirrels chittering in jealousy. There are no ground landings on these canopy tours?each of the nine lines spans from platform to platform for maximum excitement.
Where prospectors once used the running waters of a river to search their hauls for gems and gold, Copperhead Creek Gem Mining Company employs a winding wooden sluice. Deputized geologists shovel scoops of raw material sourced from 12 mines into wire mesh sifters, allowing the current to carry off the dirt and reveal the colorful stones that lie within. The company also offers bags of mining rough that are likely to contain fossils and arrowheads, along with geodes that visitors can crack at home by using a hammer or throwing them really hard against a tree.
The artists at Wine and Canvas awaken their students’ inner Rembrandts and Van Goghs with classes that pair a featured painting with specialty cocktails and wines. The mobile studio’s monthly calendar includes themed classes in which instructors expound on the nuances of painting Parisian street lamps, Japanese flowers, or Venetian cityscapes. The master painters—many of them local artists—provide step-by-step instructions while students mimic each stroke and periodically dip their brushes into glasses filled with crimson cabernet. Each of the studio’s various drink-friendly venues boasts a specialty libation selected to incite creativity or conversations with fellow painters. When the artistic frenzy concludes, students return home with a finished masterpiece large enough to conceal any wall safe or mirror portal.
Beneath their joke-slinging exterior, comedians can be fiercely competitive. When vying for club bookings or working material at open mic night, their desire to be the best bubbles up and sharpens their wit. So when Indiana Comedy Festival puts a $5,000 prize on the line, it turns the competition into a war. Across three weeks and 14 cities, 20 comedians fling their best anecdotes and observations to make it to the finals and get within a mic-stand's reach of the purse. These are no amateurs, however; many of the contestants boast credits from such programs as Comedy Central's Live at Gotham, HBO's Def Comedy Jam, and The Bob and Tom Show.
Tony Jacobs, the head instructor at Spear Tip Tactics, doesn’t sweat under pressure, and he doesn’t want his students to either. Using his advanced and diverse training across disciplines such as fighting, surviving, numerous weapons, tactical driving, rotary insertion and extractions, and active shooter/terrorist, he leads courses that could one day save a student’s life. Courses range from survival skills such as water purification, fire-building, and trapping and snares to hand-to-hand combat, knife use and knife fighting, and tactical tracking.