It was hot... REALLY hot during this stay and on Friday while David was at work Samantha got the slip-n-slide out for the girls to cool off on. Of course they had a ball. My happiness was complete by just watching them enjoy themselves.
It should be noted that Riley continues to increase her adverturous spirit. This girl will drink from anywhere and I mean anywhere! This water is coming straight out of the hose and certainly isn't bad. The other places from which she quenched her throat were not so healthy, but they were funny :)
Hannah continues to be the most incredibly loving big sister and here she models her new bikini that she was very proud of.
Papa's girls... and Papa. That is not a mole on Riley's chin. Love those pigtails :)
On Saturday David got us all into their new van and took us out to a zoo. He had mentioned wanting to make this trip prior to my heading over there and I did look at the web site. I do have to admit that from the web site it looked pretty rinky-dink. Afterall, I have been to some of the 'best' zoos in the world... Brookfield, San Diego, Miami-Dade, and others and some animal shelter zoo place in Cameron, NC of all places had me expecting perhaps a bit of fun for the little ones but that was about all. Well, oh ye of little faith... let me tell you! This trip to the Aloha Safari Zoo turned out to be the best zoo experience I have ever had. This place was incredible. It was kind of like the zoo trips I had as a youngster... before all the rules and animal-protection crap came along. I mean you could REALLY interact with the animals here and boy oh boy, did the girls interact! Some pictures follow but it doesn't capture the essense of the place... simple, pretty, family-orientated, lots of different animals, a "safari ride" right through a lot of animals, bread given to the patrons to toss to the animals, and more I'm surely forgetting.
We got there shortly after the park opened, parked, and had arrived at the goat area. Here the 3 blondes are near the goat enclosure when something gets their attention. The staff had started bringing out animals and the first one just happened to be a rather large white python. Of course Miss Fearless went right for it.
After petting the snake attention turned back to the goats. The girls got quite a kick out of being able to pet them and such and it was such fun to just stand back and watch them do it.
We had gotten on to the safari ride and afterwards David took Hannah over to feed the giraffe. They were both pretty good at it and, again, it was just so darn fun to see everyone having so much fun.
There were countless highlights of this day but perhaps this session stands apart just a bit. Samantha had packed lunch for everyone and we were enjoying ourselves in the lovely picnic area when out comes a staff member with a big snake... I mean BIG snake. 15 foot, 150 pound python. He just put the thing on the ground and let it crawl around! What 'top' zoo does that?!?!? For a brief moment it looked like Riley would hop right on for a ride but she settled on just touching it... and touching it... and touching it. Hannah joined in and yes, I finally kind of touched it as well, but only once.
Samantha got this shot... one showing this snake from head to tail. It's a big snake.
The picnic area was pretty much back where we had started and that was close to the goat enclosure. During the morning David had gotten a bag of animal food -- popcorn and bread -- that the girls had fed just about every animal with through the visit. This time was pretty neat as the adults just let the girls wander where they wanted to. Not out of sight but off on their own. What's left of the bag of food is laying there on the ground. Riley of course being Riley made it a habit of giving some to the animals and then having some for herself as well. I don't know how many times Samantha and/or David said "Yucky, Riley... no" but it didn't matter to Riley... off the ground or not :)
We spent about 3 1/2 hours here I think it was and every minute was great. There was so much done and seen that I haven't mentioned here. Shoot... it took all the resolve Samantha and David could muster not to buy a little baby pot-bellied pig that was being sold! It was soooooo cute :) Then there was me watching David watching the tiger that was making moves to line up a jump at Riley. That was kind of freaky actually. Regretfully all fun things end and so did our outing at the zoo. I still got to spend another couple days with them before heading back home and those times too will go in the collection of life memories. This trip happened over the Labor Day weekend which meant that I got an extra day with David not at work. Four full days and five nights made for a great, great visit and I'm already missing them all. Road trip in the making :)
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