Day 22. Sunday July 4
Nick & his parents came to see me! I checked into the casino hotel a few hours before their arrival and used the pool. ahhh. I then fell asleep on the bed while waiting. It was so exciting to see them through that peephole! ^_^ I kept squishy hugging Nick- I'd missed him so much!! It was heaven to get to cuddle with him when we fell asleep. :)
We slept in a little the next morning, and got to Wildlife Safari (my park) just a bit before our first scheduled encounter- "The Elephant Barn Adventure". We rode out to the Elephant Barn and watched some training, then we all got to feed Alice a carrot and pet her trunk. Someone had purchased a painting, so we got to see her paint a picture for them. :) Then we did our drive-thru. Everyone seemed to love it! We saw the zebras very close too, which I usually don't experience. During the drive-thru we stopped off at the Elephant Carwash which was AMAZING! Alice & Tiki both cleaned my car! Alice sprays water like a shower, and Tiki puts her nostrils right on the car and then sprays. They both held sponges and dabbed the car as if they were sudsing it up, then "rinsed" it. :) We had some Bison blocking the road and causing a traffic jam, a Guanaco nibbling on Nick's window (he closed it just in case it would have spit!), a Giraffe walking between cars, and the "Rockie deer" (dik-dik) leaping across the road.
We slept in a little the next morning, and got to Wildlife Safari (my park) just a bit before our first scheduled encounter- "The Elephant Barn Adventure". We rode out to the Elephant Barn and watched some training, then we all got to feed Alice a carrot and pet her trunk. Someone had purchased a painting, so we got to see her paint a picture for them. :) Then we did our drive-thru. Everyone seemed to love it! We saw the zebras very close too, which I usually don't experience. During the drive-thru we stopped off at the Elephant Carwash which was AMAZING! Alice & Tiki both cleaned my car! Alice sprays water like a shower, and Tiki puts her nostrils right on the car and then sprays. They both held sponges and dabbed the car as if they were sudsing it up, then "rinsed" it. :) We had some Bison blocking the road and causing a traffic jam, a Guanaco nibbling on Nick's window (he closed it just in case it would have spit!), a Giraffe walking between cars, and the "Rockie deer" (dik-dik) leaping across the road.
After our drive-thru we did 5 more encounters!
1) Hay Ride. Just us and a couple with their little boy. We rode out in the grass to feed the Sika Deer (from Japan) some sliced carrots. The came right up and took carrots from our outstreched hands! (we had to stay on the truck tho). Very cute! Two of them were each missing an eye, "Captain Jack" and "Pirate Pete". The truck broke down, so we had to wait for a van to come get us. The other family were offered a free Big Bear, so they came with us to...
2) Big Bear. There were us and about 7 other people. Since this is one of my department things, I was able to do the training while Angela did the presentation. Nick seemed proud. :)
3) Lion 101. Just us this time. :) Angela did the presentation again while I just distracted the other lion. Pretty laid back and comfortable for everyone.
4) Tiger/Cheetah. Just us. This was supposed to just be viewing the Cheetahs, and then watching a tiger get trained (like Lion 101), but it was dinner time for the Cheetahs, and since I was an intern there, we were invited to help feed them! We were all very excited about this! We all got to take big hunks of meat and toss them into the appropriate pens. The Cheetahs jump up to catch the meat and then dart off to find a good spot to eat. We also watched Saigon the Siberian Tiger do some training tricks. Leah (his sister) is less people-friendly. Oh well.
5) Lion/Bear Feed. Just us. This is the encounter where people are taken to the Lion hut to feed them and put them to bed, and then to the Brown Bear hut to put them in and watch them eat. The Lion hut part was so cool! The Lions all did their carrolling (roaring) which is always awesome (Nick told me how cool it was that you could feel it in your chest!). When we were letting Natasha (the old girl- 20 years old) in, she came up to the fence and rubbed. (She was hand-raised, so is very affectionate to people). I had Nick sit near her for a pic and she rubbed up right behind him! ^_^ When the Lions were all fed and mostly finished with their dinners, we headed to the Brown Bear hut. We went upstairs while they were let in, Gary rang the dinner bell (cowbell) to call them in. Then we went downstairs and next to their rooms to watch them eat. It is so cool to be RIGHT next to them with just a fence separating you! The bears were all cute, as always, and everyone enjoyed it so much.
1) Hay Ride. Just us and a couple with their little boy. We rode out in the grass to feed the Sika Deer (from Japan) some sliced carrots. The came right up and took carrots from our outstreched hands! (we had to stay on the truck tho). Very cute! Two of them were each missing an eye, "Captain Jack" and "Pirate Pete". The truck broke down, so we had to wait for a van to come get us. The other family were offered a free Big Bear, so they came with us to...
2) Big Bear. There were us and about 7 other people. Since this is one of my department things, I was able to do the training while Angela did the presentation. Nick seemed proud. :)
3) Lion 101. Just us this time. :) Angela did the presentation again while I just distracted the other lion. Pretty laid back and comfortable for everyone.
4) Tiger/Cheetah. Just us. This was supposed to just be viewing the Cheetahs, and then watching a tiger get trained (like Lion 101), but it was dinner time for the Cheetahs, and since I was an intern there, we were invited to help feed them! We were all very excited about this! We all got to take big hunks of meat and toss them into the appropriate pens. The Cheetahs jump up to catch the meat and then dart off to find a good spot to eat. We also watched Saigon the Siberian Tiger do some training tricks. Leah (his sister) is less people-friendly. Oh well.
5) Lion/Bear Feed. Just us. This is the encounter where people are taken to the Lion hut to feed them and put them to bed, and then to the Brown Bear hut to put them in and watch them eat. The Lion hut part was so cool! The Lions all did their carrolling (roaring) which is always awesome (Nick told me how cool it was that you could feel it in your chest!). When we were letting Natasha (the old girl- 20 years old) in, she came up to the fence and rubbed. (She was hand-raised, so is very affectionate to people). I had Nick sit near her for a pic and she rubbed up right behind him! ^_^ When the Lions were all fed and mostly finished with their dinners, we headed to the Brown Bear hut. We went upstairs while they were let in, Gary rang the dinner bell (cowbell) to call them in. Then we went downstairs and next to their rooms to watch them eat. It is so cool to be RIGHT next to them with just a fence separating you! The bears were all cute, as always, and everyone enjoyed it so much.
After that, the park was closed, so we left to go have dinner and go to the park to watch fireworks. We met Ron & Kathy Lawrence there. Actually... there were so many people that we couldn't find them at first and just sat on a blanket to relax for a while. I finally spotted them, and they'd been keeping an eye out for us too! Oh well. We met up in time to head to their church to sit outside. They'd brought chairs for us too. :) A very nice relaxing hang out for all of us. The fireworks show was very good for such a small city! It actually went on too long, and had about 6 or 7 grand finales! haha. People kept clapping and cheering when they thought it was over, and then more fireworks would go off! sheesh. Gary got up at one point, cuz it just had to be the final finale, but it wasn't! haha. We were all over it by the time it finally ended. We stood at the Lawrences' car for a while talking, then drove back to our hotel for some sleep! And what a comfy hotel bed- ahhhh! (Complete with spooning with Nick, my love!)
You didn't get a picture of Alice's painting?!
ReplyDeleteLOL - the elephant car wash... HAHAHAH.... so funny to imagine! ^_^
who is Guanaco?
VERY cool that you could do training & distracting & feeding while you were out with Nick & fam. ^_^