EMLF’s Fall Symposium will be held October 13-15, 2026 in Lexington, Kentucky. The Symposium will include a fantastic line-up of topics and speakers, as well as opportunities for attendees to network with one another. But there are also plenty of fun things to do outside the conference.
We have some suggestions from EMLF’s executive director, Anna Girard Fletcher, a longtime resident of Lexington, and LSU professor Keith Hall, chairman of our newsletter committee. Professor Hall broke his own record by bringing 27 LSU law school students with him to the Fall Symposium last year.
Bourbon distillery tours and the Bourbon Trail
Kentucky Bourbon is famous and many fans of bourbon are familiar with the Kentucky Bourbon Trail, where visitors can taste different bourbons and see numerous distilleries. (https://kybourbontrail.com/).
And there is more to it than tasting bourbon. There is also the opportunity to learn about the technology and science of distillation. says LSU’s Professor Keith Hall, who brings students to the Fall Symposium each year, was a chemical engineer before becoming a lawyer. He notes that there are multiple bourbon distilleries in Lexington itself that offer distillery tours and tastings. He explained:
In 2022, I brought three students to EMLF’s Fall Symposium. After the Symposium, we went to a nearby distillery that offered tours. As part of the tour, the distillery offered tastings of different bourbons, but I am convinced that what my students really enjoyed was seeing the distillation technology and hearing the tour guide’s explanation of why the different bourbons the students were sampling tasted different from one another. The students became more enthusiastic as the tour and tastings went on. They enjoyed the science so much that word spread around LSU Law School. The next year, 2023, LSU’s student attendance at the Fall Symposium tripled to ten students. We took another distillery tour, and the students had fun again. The following years, 2024, LSU attendance more than double to 23 LSU students who attended the Fall Symposium. We made sure to take another distillery tour and in 2025 attendance increased again, with 27 LSU students going to Lexington for the 2025 Fall Symposium. It warms my chemical engineering heart, but I never imagined that law students would be so intrigued by the technology of distillation and the science behind why the various bourbons they sample during the tour taste different!
Horse racing at Keeneland
Lexington’s Keeneland race track is one of the most famous horse-racing venues in the world, (https://www.keeneland.com/), with its fall racing season and “Championship Sale” drawing visitors from around the world. During the 2026 “Fall Meet” and “Breeder’s Cup,” there will be racing almost every afternoon in October (except for Mondays and Tuesdays), and EMLF’s Fall Symposium is during the middle of the Fall Meet. This gives Symposium attendees a chance to see some fine horses and racing at Keeneland after the conference is over.
Professor Keith Hall said, “The Fall Symposium ends midday on a Thursday. Many of my students schedule an early evening flight home and spend Thursday afternoon at Keeneland. My students usually hate math, but they seem to enjoy playing the odds at the track. Back in Baton Rouge, they usually claim in class that they cannot do math, but at Keeneland they sure seem to understand how the math works when their money is involved and a winning ticket pays five-to-one!”
Restaurants and food
There is a lot to offer for food lovers in Lexington. Many Lexington restaurants serve hot browns, a hearty regional dish, though the Brown Hotel in Louisville claims to be the origin of this Kentucky dish. The base of the dish is toast, topped with turkey, bacon, a Mornay sauce (and sometimes other cheeses), and a tomato slice.
While some of Lexington’s best-known restaurants, such as Malone’s or Giuseppe’s, are out in more suburban areas, a few great spots to try downtown near the conference are italX, Infinity, and Frank and Dino’s. Up Main Street a bit, you’ll find a great meal at Cole’s 735 Main or Carson’s. For upscale steakhouses, try Jeff Ruby’s Steakhouse or Tony’s of Lexington. Unfortunately fan favorite lunch spot Zim’s closed last year, but there are still some great lunch options like Pearl’s (the best pizza dough!), Corto Lima (famous local chef), and Sawyer’s (great burgers). For dinner when you get in on Tuesday, you can’t go wrong with Le Deauville’s all you can eat mussels and fries special!
It was nearly impossible for EMLF Executive Director Anna Fletcher to pick a favorite Lexington restaurant. She explained:
I’m partial to Frank & Dino’s and I always order the Fagottini Sinatra even though I say I’m going to try something new. It’s just so good. Probably the best all-around restaurant downtown though is Dudley’s. It really is a Lexington institution, and just as good for lunch as it is for dinner. It’s on Short Street now but it got its name when it was originally a few blocks south in the old Dudley School, which is named for Dr. Benjamin Dudley, a local surgeon in the early 19th century who once shot a fellow doctor in a duel, then jumped in and treated his wound, saving his life. And they have a great hot brown!
SEC sports
For those who want to spend several days in Lexington before the Fall Symposium, an option is to look for football tickets for the October 10 game between LSU and Kentucky. Anna Fletcher jokes, “there are always plenty of tickets available for a UK home football game that far into the season!”
Fans of storied basketball programs may want to stick around an extra day to see the Kentucky Wildcats take on Little Rock in an exhibition game upstairs from the conference at historic Rupp Arena.
Other things to do in Lexington
In Lexington, you can take a tour of the Mary Todd Lincoln House or a horse farm. There is an art walk and plenty of bars, including a large number of college bars. One of Lexington’s oldest bars is right around the corner from the conference location – The Rosebud Bar. On Mill Street, its Silks Lounge room is in a building that originally held a chocolate shop rumored to be Mary Todd Lincoln’s favorite, and entertained General Lafayette on his post-war tour of America.
