Annual Red Bay, Alabama Trip

On our way back home in April, we always have work to be done at Tiffin Motor Homes, where our coach was built.  We had a few things that were under warranty plus we wanted to get rid of our front curtains and have some shades installed.

They have over 50 stalls in their garage and about 100 hook-ups for people waiting to have work done.  You can see them all lined up.  It took us 2 weeks.

While in Red Bay, we had to introduce our favorite place to another couple from Maine who were waiting for work to be done.  The Rattlesnake Saloon.

You can't drive your own car down, they have a pick-up truck with seats in the back that drives you down there.

As you can see, the road is steep and narrow.

This is looking back up at it.

This is a huge cave, see the stone ceiling.

It's really awesome to see it in person, pictures don't do it any justice.  And the food is great.





A Day at the Zoo

We spent  March 16th at the Brevard Zoo in Melbourne.   It was an incredible place.  When I think zoo I think animals in cages.  These animals were all in large areas set up like their natural environment.

Check out these giraffes, the 2 laying down are just papies.

They track all births and where the babies go so that they don't inter-breed.

I love their faces.

Check out the bird, I like how they mix the animals they can instead of seperating them all.

Here's an ostrich with 2 kangaroos.  I really wanted to take a picture of one standing up, but could wait just so long for one to get up.  Must have been nap time.

The birds were awesome, and so colorful.


Check out the stork, guess there weren't any baby deliveries that day, or it was his day off.

So many are so bright.

There were several birds in this area that you could feed nectar to in little cups.

Like this.  They came right up to the people.

I thought this one looked really different.  Almost like an artist painted a wooded bird whatever way he wanted to.

Two bald eagles.  They were injured and couldn't fly.

Look at this very long beak.

There were loads of flamingo's but could not get a picture of one with it's neck straight.  I guess they were all cleaning themselves.

We saw rhinorasus, wild pigs, leopards, turtles, snakes, etc.  Had so many pictures tried to pick just the best ones



EcoSafari

On Feb 24 we watched another launch from right in front of our coach, isn't that cool?

Our WiFi card was having trouble with these downloads and telling us we were over our limit so I'm way behind on postings.  We finally got a new one and it seems to be working fine.  So here goes with catching up.

On March 2nd we went to Florida EcoSafari.  Paul & Joyce and Don wanted to go on the zip line, but not me, not with my fear of heights, so I went on the safari.  While waiting for our turn to go, we had lunch and had a visitor.  The resident cat.

This is the bus I rode on.  The 4700 acre parcel of land is a true Florida eco system, with only native plants & animals.  There are wild hogs in Florida, but they're not native to Florida, so they catch them and put them in a large pen away from the rest of the eco system.

Look at this huge water bird drying its wings. We also saw lots of alligators and baby alligators that travel on mama's back. Since they were in water covered with green water plants, like

you see here, it's hard to make out the alligators so I didn't include the pictures.

There were so many strange colors of cows.  That grey & black one was really wierd.

This was a pregnant one about to deliver.

These 5 calves were so cute, just watching us, they all got up and got closer then all of a sudden all turned around and walked away, like "Oh, Oh, we're gonna to get in trouble"

I would have loved to see this peacock with its wings opened.

Day at the Beach, by Bruno

This was in February.
My Daddy works 5 mornings a week and so does Mama.  On Fridays I usually have to stay in the motor home by myself for a while so they can go visit stuff with their friends, Casey's Mom & Dad.  There's my Dad painting.

One Friday, they asked me if I wanted to go.  They don't have to ask twice, I run right out and wait for them to open the door to the jeep.

 They decided to take us to a dog beach, we had to keep our leash on, but it was fun anyway.

I absolutely LOVE the water.

When I come out I like rolling in the sand, kinda upsets my Mama, but it's so much fun.  I go play in the water, come out and roll in the sand, back & forth.

Don't I look handsome all wet and full of sand?

They have a dog wash in the parking lot, Mama & Daddy were pretty happy about that.

That was fun, now we go back home.

Oh good, water, that water we played in was salty, I'm thirsty.

I slept all the way home.

I still had so much sand on me, Daddy had to brush me, and that feels so good.

Oh yes, my couch.  What a good day, beats staying home alone.

Air Boat Ride

We went for an air boat ride in Christmas, Florida.

They had different animal exhibits.  Several large snakes, some birds, a working bee hive (between 2 pieces of glass) and this pig.

It was HUGE.  The owners said they fed it too much when it was small.  It looks like it wouldn't be able to walk, but they said he goes outside every day.  This was his nap time.

This is the airboat we rode on, there were only 8 of us.  Look at the big fan in the back.

We went down the St.Johns River, the longest river in Florida.  It's also the only river in the eastern U.S. that flows north.

These birds called Egrets are tall and slim but have such a wing-span which makes them beautiful in flight, especially when they first take off.

The water was quite shallow in alot of places and the strangest looking thing were the cattle fields that look like they're right in the river.  Check out this cow walking in the water. 

Look at them, they almost look like they're walking on water.  And check out the alligator, they don't bother the cows.

The noise of the engine and the fan was so loud we needed to wear headsets so we could hear the boat operator and ask questions.

Cattle again, makes you wonder how they got on that little piece of land.  They look stranded, but they're not.

More alligators, they were all over the place.

See the baby calves?

It was so swampy sometimes it looked like we were headed for land, a little scary when you're going 45 mph. 

This place was awesome, you can see the different water levels through the years.  He pointed out the different hurricanes based on the different water lines on the trees.

These are cypress trees.  Those things comming up through the ground are not cut trees, they call them knees.  They come up from the roots.  They're kind of cool.

And here we are back to the dock.

Can you believe I'm actually holding a baby alligator?  Notice its mouth is tied closed.  All in all, this was a very fun and interesting trip.