I have visited Big Bone Lick State Historic Site a couple of times in the past, but that was many years ago. Since then, I’ve passed it several times, without stopping, on the way to Rabbit Hash. A friend visited both last week, and their description of that visit made me promise myself that I would return. A sunny Thursday almost immediately provided a perfect opportunity.

My first stop at the park was the Visitor Center. In addition to having a gift shop, helpful attendants, and a supply of information and maps, the center houses a small but very interesting museum. A panel just inside the door offers a pretty good overview of the park. That big guy in the foreground of the third photo is a Harlan’s Ground Sloth.

At the rear of the Visitor Center is a life-sized diorama depicting how earlier visitors to the salt springs might become trapped in the bogs and involuntarily leave their bones for future scientists. Big Bone Lick is on the Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail, not because the Corps of Discovery stopped here but because both of its captains did. At the urging of President Jefferson, Meriwether Lewis visited the site in 1803 on his way west to join William Clark. The boat carrying the specimens he collected sank on its way to Jefferson. In 1807, after that famous expedition to the Pacific Ocean, Clark made a stop here to collect and ship specimens that did reach the President.

Although they have absolutely nothing to do with vertebrate paleontology, I found the smallish examples of wildlife flitting about in front of the Visitor Center a lot of fun to watch.

A paved path that begins a short distance from the Visitor Center leads to an elevated bison viewing stand. But no bison presented themselves to be viewed there today. Instead, the small herd was lounging in the grass, just out of sight, a short distance away.

Having noted that I’ve passed Big Bone Lick a number of times while driving to Rabbit Hash, continuing on to the one-of-a-kind river town after my stop was rather natural. Besides, if I hadn’t, I could not have put “bunnies” in the title. I grabbed an ice-cold ginger ale at the general store, then sipped it as I watched the Ohio River flow by.

This intersection, just east of US 42 about two and a half miles east of Big Bone Lick, marks the community of Beaverlick. I believe there used to be limit signs here, but I found none today. If I didn’t imagine them, I’m guessing they are hanging on a college dorm wall somewhere. Until a year or so ago, there was a Beaverlick Trading Post at US 42, but it is now an ice cream stand, and almost all of the signage has been changed. They’ve not yet taken care of a couple of side doors, however. Places like Big Bone Lick and Beaver Lick (now Beaverlick) were salt licks where various animals came to get a little salt in their diet. They were named for the lickers, not the lickees.

To complete what has turned into a survey of the area’s smile-inducing place names, I stopped at an establishment that appears to be the last remaining enterprise acknowledging that the community of Sugartit once existed. It’s just a few miles north of those spots made famous by salt-licking beavers and big boned animals.