This entry was posted on Saturday, February 2nd, 2008 at 4:29 am and is filed under Animals, Bay Area Backroads, Friends, Pictures. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
First, I should really apologize for the really long delay between posts. I’ve been busy, which isn’t really a good excuse, and I was having a problem uploading photos to the site. Fortunately for everyone, I have resolved the photo problem (woo hoo!) and I am back to writing. So for fans of my children you can rejoice.
Better news is that we didn’t stop doing things while I was busy and struggling with Linux distros, but instead we go to enjoying a variety of different things. One of our favorite activities continues to be the zoo and this time we went and met the entire Shumaker clan, who also joined and will hopefully enjoy their membership with us from time to time.
As always we took in the Children’s Zoo, but this time we started at “the bottom entrance,” which virtually leaves you at the entrance to the Children’s Zoo. The girls got a very close look at a crocodile and got to learn some things about it, too. There was a young man there sharing how the fourth tooth shows on the crocodile and their jaw is weak - weak enough actually that an average person could hold it closed. Apparently that’s one way to tell the difference between a crocodile and an aligator. Ok, sure, you first. To put the pictures above into some perspective, when above the water we were only about two inches and a fence away from being able to touch the head of this amazingly prehistoric looking creature.
In the reptile pavilon we got a good look at some other lizard like creatures, including a black lizard that was literally looking to eat children. He was running up and jumping at the glass. By far the weirdest thing I’ve ever seen.
We did some playing around with the tortise’s shell and even took in the empty Lemur exhibit. Personally, I find it much more exciting when there’s something there, but the girls thought it was pretty fun all the same. Then they saw the giant fruit bats which look more like monsters than bats to me, and Michele Shumaker didn’t like them too much either, so I know I’m not alone on that one. Fortunately, with youth comes bravery and the children weren’t the least bit phased.
In the children’s area they have a whole lot of animal shaped toys including a climbing net that resembles a spider’s web. Sofi wanted to play “caught in the web,” which is pretty weird to me, because I can’t imagine how she correlates being caught in the web and the spider’s dinner. I guess that will come later on.
Before leaving we took in lunch at the zoo - with corn dogs being the most popular for the day and then we went on a few rides including the little cars and the train. It was quite a bit of fun and as you can see everyone seemed to have a roaring good time. Hopefully Mama had a good day, too, because this was Papa’s day with the girls while Mama went to some shower for someone that I haven’t met or don’t remember meeting… or something like that.
Papa
