Road trips by city

Road trips from Louisville

11 back-roads routes start within a 4.5-hour drive of Louisville, including 0 day trips and 10 weekend drives; 2 ready-made itineraries begin nearby.

Drive times are estimates to the nearer end of each route (straight-line miles plus a quarter, at 50 mph); the atlas itself never routes you onto an interstate once the drive begins.

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Weekend road trips from Louisville

• US 60: The Mutton Line
  Starts in Louisville
  Louisville → Paducah · ~220 mi · 2 days · skips I-64 / the parkways
• Bourbon, Bluegrass & Shakers
  About 1 h 45 min to Lexington
  Lexington → Mammoth Cave · ~180 mi · 2–3 days · skips I-64 / I-65
• The Wilderness Road
  About 2 h 20 min to Berea
  Bristol → Berea · ~220 mi · 2–3 days · skips I-75 / I-81
• US 127: The Plateau & the Sale
  About 2 h 50 min to Albany, KY
  Chattanooga → Albany, KY · ~160 mi · 2 days · skips I-40
• Moonbows & the Gorge
  About 2 h 55 min to Slade
  Slade → Cumberland Falls · ~150 mi · 2 days · skips I-75 (mostly)
• The Trail of Tears: Georgia to Kentucky
  About 3 h 20 min to Hopkinsville
  New Echota → Hopkinsville · ~350 mi · 3 days · skips I-75 / I-24
• The Middle Tennessee Pike
  About 3 h 50 min to Nashville
  Nashville → Muscle Shoals · ~140 mi · 2 days · skips I-65
• US 70: Broadway of America
  About 3 h 50 min to Nashville
  Memphis → Nashville · ~210 mi · 2 days · skips I-40
• US 41: Dixie Highway, Nashville to Chattanooga
  About 3 h 50 min to Nashville
  Nashville → Chattanooga · ~220 mi · 2 days · skips I-24
• US 23: The Country Music Highway
  About 4 h 15 min to Ashland
  Ashland → Pikeville · ~140 mi · 1–2 days · skips I-64

Named parkways and scenic byways within reach

• Natchez Trace Parkway
  About 3 h 50 min to Nashville
  Natchez → Nashville · ~444 mi · 3–4 days · skips I-55 / I-65 corridor

Longer itineraries starting near Louisville

• A Reader's Central Kentucky: Bardstown to Shaker Village
  3 days · ~160 mi · from Bardstown, KY
  Sent in by a reader who came home with a Shaker Village membership: three unhurried days of Civil War museums, an 1845 inn, a Main Street café's Pig…
• Bourbon, Bluegrass & Shakers
  3 days · ~300 mi · from Lexington, KY
  Horse country to cave country the reverent way: a preserved Shaker village, a Trappist abbey, Lincoln's birthplace and the bourbon trail's holiest…

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