South Korea Delegation Gets Tour of Paducah

Members of the Icheon, South Korea delegation, including their mayor to the UNESCO Creative Cities annual meeting used their last day in Paducah to experience some of what the region has to offer.

They began their day with a tour of Paducah's Purple Toad Winery, where they learned about the process of making and bottling wines, and how owner Allen Dossey, his wife June, and son Steven went from startup to the largest winery in Kentucky in less than 8 years.

From there it was a quick tour of the Whitehaven welcome center, and a bite of Knoth's barbecue before rounding out their whirlwind tour with an afternoon boat ride around Kentucky and Barkley Lake.  The group was interested in the operation of both dams and the inner workings of the river industry, having learning about its importance to the region with a tour of Paducah's River Discovery Center on Wednesday.

Icheon is one of eight cities from around the world that are in Paducah as UNESCO Creative cities of Crafts and Folk Art.  Representatives from Kansas City, KS and Lexington, KY also attended as candidate cities.

Paducah was honored to host this first ever annual meeting of the cities, which began Sunday. Over the last four days the delegations got to experience many of the things that earned Paducah the designation in 2013, and heard from many regionally and nationally prominent speakers about how the arts and arts related tourism are strong, viable, and sustainable methods for economic development, growth, and enrichment of communities and the world.

When the Mayor of Icheon was asked what about Paducah has surprised him the most, his response was, "The people here are so helpful and friendly. Everything is just so beautiful here."