The places that don't make you apologize for the kids. Restaurants with crayons that aren't an afterthought, parks with shade and bathrooms, the ice-cream stop with the line on a hot Tuesday.
A trail system launching from the state park's Nature Center: the 6.5-mile Main Trail to Totem Rock, a Native American and settler rock shelter; the 2-mile Wildlife Management Demonstration Trail; and The Narrows, a quarter-mile 1800s wagon trail with rock walls carved with century-old initials.
A weekly farmers market by the Railway Museum on Highway 56 in French Lick — produce, baked goods, and handmade crafts from local vendors.
A historic excursion train run by the Indiana Railway Museum through the Hoosier National Forest and the Burton Tunnel, on trackage the Southern Railway donated when the museum settled in French Lick in the late 1970s.