The Zoo

Yesterday we drove the 3 hours down to San Francisco & took everybody to the zoo.

We also stopped & played on the beach just long enough for everyone to get wet, sandy & miserable for the drive home ;)

I may have shared a time or 2 (ahem) how for the last 30 days solid we have had nothing but wet, blowy, gray, ugly nasty weather?

I desperately needed a mini-vacation.

Just something fun.

So on a whim we packed everybody up & headed out.

It was a beautiful day in San Francisco.

65ish. Mostly sun shiny. No wind. No gray. It was lovely.

Now the irony of going to San Francisco to get warm & see the sun should not be lost.

Mark Twain once said “the coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco”.

Care to guess how many pictures I took throughout the day?

Oh, come on, guess.

Nope. Nope. No, more than that.

No! Not that many!

Try again.

Yes! I took 279 pictures of our day.

I love my camera. (happy sigh)

It was a great day.

The only real bummer was that my oldest & bestest friend in the world, who lives in SF & whom I haven’t seen in 3 yrs, was in ARIZONA so we didn’t get to see her.

Talk about bad timing…it’s a conspiracy I tell you.

Anyway.

We played several rousing games of Alphabet Bingo on the way down.

I won the first 3 in a row. (I came. I saw. I conquered.)

And we made it into the city & back out with no navigational errors.

We even had cash for the toll booths.

That is huge for us :)

We had a wonderful time at the zoo.

We haven’t been in 12 years or so.

My 3 youngest weren’t born yet & my 15 year old didn’t remember when he had gone.

They kept commenting on how big it was.

They didn’t expect it to be so big.

I kept saying “I told you so” ;)

We saw lots of awesome animals.

We were disappointed that they didn’t have any elephants :( but we survived.

Which was my favorite?

Hmmmm.

I love giraffes. They are just uber cool.

The patterns of their coat, their faces, they way they move. Very cool.

But…

My favorites have always been the bears. I love bears. I adore bears.

No, I am not stupid enough to think the bear wants to do anything other than rip off my head & use it as a soccer ball. And I am not going to Alaska any time soon to pay someone to let me sit on a streambank & watch the grizzlies feed <shudder>

I just like bears. Always have.

I think the polar bears were the little boys’ favorite.

And then some.

Have y’all seen the movie “Alaska”?

A couple of kids go on an adventure & befriend a polar bear cub. They name the cub “Cubby”  (yeah, who knew right?)

DP loves that movie. As a little bub he translated “Cubby” into “Peppy” & promptly named one of his toy bears that.

(Peppy has been featured in the blog several times. She often travels with us.)

So as soon as we got to the polar bear exhibit there were cries of “Peppy!” “Peppy’s mama!” “Oh THANKYOU Mama for bringing us to see Peppy!”

Yeppers. I think Peppy was big hit.

That & the Anaconda :P

<shudder>

The ocean was a big hit too.

It was NJ’s first time to see the ocean.

It took him a bit to warm up to it.

He didn’t want to take off his shoes or get wet.

Silly boy.

DP however jumped into it whole hog & promptly got knocked down & rolled by a wave and soaked.

Thank You Lord for spare clothes in the pickup :)

Sometimes I don’t realize how much I miss the ocean until I am there again.

For while now I am a full fledged snow bunny mountain girl (and would not change it for anything) I was born a flatlander beach girl.

I was born in Santa Monica, as were my sisters, and the first place my parents took us on the way home from the hospital was to the pier to see the ocean.

And most of my memories of growing up are beach related.

I just felt you needed to know that apparently ;)

So it was a fabulous day (except for missing our turn off on the way home & adding an hour to the trip & just maybe getting a bit snippy about it but we don’t need to go into that…)

Photos anyone? <blink.blink.>

Here we are!

Wow! Look!

Giraffes are cool.

King of the jungle! ROAR!

Queen of the jungle?

Hold still Dad. You have a little something right here...

Ooooo. What's in here?

"Funny little rock hopper penguins"

Handsome is as handsome does.

A whole knew meaning to mud wrestling...

Aren't they cute?

This handsome fellow was following us around...

And... things we do for fun...

Peppy!

Pretty bird.

Anaconda. <shudder>

See the joey? Can you huh? Isn't that c~ute!

The beach!

Toe shoes in the sand.

Run!

Save me Daddy!

First time at the beach~ this stuff is pretty cool!

(yes, I have a thing for toes in the water)

Wipe out!

I'm all wet!

Foot prints in the sand.

This may well be my favorite picture :)

Me & my honey.

Bye bye ocean!

Blessings.