The Early family: January 2017

Sunday, January 15, 2017

Girl's Weekend on Safari!

For MLK weekend, Maddy and I decided to take off for a special girl's weekend together:). We had heard about Lion Country Safari and decided to make the 3 hr drive early on Saturday morning to check it out. The park is about 45 mins inland from West Palm Beach in the middle of nowhere. When you arrive you get a daypass and can drive the 5 mile loop as often as you like all day. We took over 2 hours the first time through - there was so much to see!

The park describes itself as America's first 'cageless zoo' - all of the animals in the main areas can roam freely and the only animals with a fence between you and your car are the lions. Evidently the park was forced to make this decision due to the fact that people were getting out of their cars. Regardless of the fence it was amazing to see so many beautiful lions at such close quarters!

They have over 900 animals on display in enormous enclosures and they all looked really well cared for and were exhibiting natural behaviors - feeding, mating, dominance fighting, herding etc...it was just amazing to sit and watch them...

After the loop you come to a separate area where you can park up and walk around. There are plenty of animal feeding experiences and we did them all and loved them all:)

See how Maddy always tries to feed the underdog? I love that sweet heart of hers...;)

But our favorite interactive experience was feeding the giraffes - they were so docile and friendly and we were totally smitten :)

We decided to go back around the loop again and I'm so glad we did since it was feeding time and the animals were really active and close to the car.

This ostrich got a little too close and tried to take our windshield wiper off. They grow to a over 350 lbs so it was actually a little scary!

On the second time around we spotted the week old newborn baby water buffalo with it's mom...

The chimpanzees were fed by the zookeepers in boats. They are all rescues and mainly former performing animals and are part of an ongoing research program to better understand their complex social structures. It was fascinating to watch them eat, play with toys and drink out of bottles!

We had a fantastic (and inexpensive) day out and it was well worth the drive. We totally recommend a day out at Lion Country Safari and can't wait to do it again soon!

Sunday, January 08, 2017

Happy New Year from the UK!

We left on Boxing Day for our family vacation in the UK. As soon as we landed at Gail's we got straight down to business with some proper English bacon...

And a half of bitter shandy at the pub....

And a mince pie at mum's...

...and a snowball at another pub:)...

We (over)indulged in many more British pleasures during the trip and I didn't photograph them all thankfully but suffice it to say shares in Walkers prawn cocktail crisps and Bovril probably saw an uptick that week...

Since my two grandnieces both had chicken pox, we switched out the order of events a bit and headed up to the Lake District at the beginning of the visit to give them chance to recover:). We live on the border of the Orlando town of Windermere so I wanted to show Mike and Maddy the original place that it was named after. This is me and Mike at Lake Windermere on our 19th wedding anniversary...

We saw a tiny bit of snow in Kendal, and a boatload of mint cake:)

We had a lovely walk around Tarn Hows and took lots of selfies with pretty English cows:)

The next day we had breakfast on the infamous Lake Coniston where Sir Malcolm Campbell had set the water speed world record at 141.74 mph (228.108 km/h) in the Bluebird in 1939. After his son Donald Campbell had set four successive records on the same lake he decided in 1967 that he needed to exceed 300 mph to retain the record. Although he achieved a top speed of over 320 mph he then sadly lost control and was killed instantly.

Mike and Maddy loved the scenery and especially the sheep:)

The Lake District is the home of William Wordsworth and Beatrix Potter. We loved pretty Hawkshead in particular...

But it was cold...! We headed back to Gail's and enjoyed a day catching up and snuggling up watching British TV. I got my fix of British birds through the window...