Friday:
Vince got home around 3:30. I asked if he had to work Saturday. He said it was basically up to him. I mentioned that if William was feeling better tomorrow that I would like to take the kids to the Zoo (since our family pass expires at the end of the month). He said if he was going anywhere, he wanted to head down toward the Falls of the Ohio and possibly the Loiusville Zoo. So I started packing. Then I hopped online and started looking to see how much the zoo cost and if I could find a motel room anywhere near it. I found several listings, but couldn't figure out how close to the zoo they were so I called their 800 number. The one I was looking at was the closest so I booked it online. Then I printed out directions from there to there and we headed out. We stopped in Linton first and grabbed some sore throat stuff and crackersfor William and Mucinex for Vince. Then we went to Arby's to get the rest of us something to eat and we headed south/east. By the time we reached Logottee, it was dark and William finally wanted something other than crackers. We pulled into McDonald's and grabbed him some chicken. Vince and I switched seats (so he could eat) and we were off again. All I can say is thank goodness for portable DVD players. That is what kept the kids entertained the whole drive down. Vince didn't care for my driving skills. Didn't help that I couldn't see. I don't know what the deal was...anyway after a second wrong turn, he wanted to drive again. I think we were in the Jasper area at this point.

I originally hoped to get there in time to go swimming before we went to bed. That didn't happen. We finally made it there around 9:30 or so. We started to watch tv, but there wasn't anything on for the kids so we went to bed.

Saturday:
William woke around 7:30 or so and said he felt fine. (Praise the Lord!) He turned on the tv and watched some cartoons while I took a shower. I didn't think we had time to go swimming, but Grace was pretty insistant. Not that I blame her...I had said we could go swimming while we were there. So we put on our swimsuits (all except Vince) and went down for the continental breakfast. Neither William or Grace ate very well. So off to the pool we went.

Their pool was nothing to 'blog' about. lol! I crack myself up. =) Seriously though. They had 2 lap lanes and really not enough area for any kids. We basically played between the 2 ladders. It was a 'health spa' that the hotel guests could use and they had people who have memberships that come in and use it. They had an exercise room upstairs as well. An older lady with her 2 year old grandson came in and my 2 would leave this kid and his toys alone so we left at 9:15. That made Grace mad, but oh well. I don't know how many times I told them to leave his stuff alone. Didn't help that the lady kept telling them they could play with it. I did manage to get one lap in...backstroke. Like to killed me! I need to get off my butt and start exercising!

We went back to our room and I re-did my hair, packed everything up and we headed out. It had been raining overnight so the suitcase had to go in the truck. Good heavens is it big. It like to never fit. Vince had to move both front seats up to get it in and then we moved them back until we were right on the suitcase. Then we headed out. I got directions from the hotel to the zoo. It was only around 4.5 miles.

We got there and went in at 10:30. I took some of the most amazing pictures of tigers. I can't remember the name of the one. It wasn't siberian, but it does start with an S. Sumetan or something like that. My camera is so stinkin' phenomimal. And that bigger lens that I bought for it...worth every penny. The pictures that we got of these 2 tigers alone, made the entrance fee (amazingly just under $39) worth every single cent. By noon, we were maybe...maybe 1/2 way through the zoo and starving. We seen the gorillas. They were pretty cool They had blackbacks and silverbacks. The silverback ones were cracking me up. Seriously, if you've never been to the Louisville Zoo you have to go if only to see the silverback gorillas. Take your camera though and your video camera. This one...had to be the dominate male was cracking me up. He KNEW I was trying to take his picture...he would look straight at me, then turn his head and look at me out of the corner of his eye. I was dying laughing. Their lighting in there really sucks though. They have 3 flourescent lights right beside the plexiglass... Ugh. I only have maybe 2-3 good shots of the big guy. I really started laughing at him though when he started picking his nose and eating it. I mean he was digging in there. Hilarious. We finally found the only place in there open with food and grabbed a bite to eat. It was on the other side of the gorillas. $29. No joke. For 2 cheeseburgers, 2 chicken tenders, 4 fries, an icee, kid's coke and a large coke. I just about passed out right there. lol! Oh well, it was food and we were all starving. I told Vince later that we should have gotten the large pizza. It was $15.00. Hind sight is 20/20 though.

I can't remember if the Lorakeets were before or after eating. I think before. Anywhoo...like the Indy Zoo, they have a place where you can go in and feed the Lorakeets. At the Indy Zoo, you might get one to comeup and land on your arm. I kid you not, I had 3-4 birds on me at once. 2-3 on the arm with the food, one on the other arm and ONE ON MY HEAD!!! They were landing on my head. Bird feet, in my hair. My worst fear was Not realized though...I had no poop on me what-so-ever when I left. lol! It was pretty cool though. I had a red and I mean red bird land on my shoulder. Vince got an awesome shot of that. We did not get a picture of them on either of our heads though. Yes, he had them on his head as well. I DO have a picture of them on a strangers head. I'll post that one when I get a chance. Vince put one on William's shoulder. He kind of laughed and then said, 'get it off.' LOL! Grace wouldn't go near it. SHE is the one who wanted to feed the birds. I don't think she would have liked it though...I'm glad I'm the one who had the food in my hand when we walked in there. The immediately started flying toward me. When you walk out of the Lorakeets thing, you can go into what they named a Walaroo Walkabout. I kid you not. As God as my witness, you walk through their enclosure. Nothing, I mean NOTHING between you and them. That was cool. I think what we seen were Walaroos. They weren't big enough to be kangaroos. One of them was almost as big as it's mama and was still nursing!

The kids passed on the petting zoo. They only had goats anyway. The last few things we seen were like the african animals. Zebras, African and Asian Elephants, camals, giraffe's, lions, rhinos and a few other things. I got some pretty good pictures of these as well. I thought the lions were going to give us an education though. lol! Vince took some pictures of these stellar seahawks? These were impressive. They were almost as tall as the eagles we had seen earlier. They were in an enclosure that Vince was able to get a picture of us beside them so you could see just how big they are. We did that with Grace and a dancing crane too.

Oh and I can't leave out how we were blessed! I found $10 on the ground that was soaking wet...so you konw the owners weren't going to be back for it. AND the gal at the food place gave us free refills!!! Whoo HOO.

After we seen the rhinos (I think they were last) we headed to the gift shop. Vince headed to the truck. lol! Grace finally picked out a black-footed penquin and William picked out a leapard seal. I took them out to the truck and went back in to get Vince and I something. I got him a black tshirt that had a tiger's face on the front. The eyes were 'brought to front' with the rest of it's face kind of faded out. Says Louisville Zoo on the sleeve. I got me a red sweatshirt that simply says Louisville Zoo on the front. I didn't particularly care for the rest of the tshirts. I didn't want one exactly like Vince's and the others were more expensive. My sweatshirt cost the same as his tshirt. They did have one with a male lion's face on the front, but I ultimately decided on the sweatshirt. If they would have had a tshirt in the $19 range with eagles on it...I would have gotten one of those.

When I got back to the truck, we headed out. I started going through pictures and deleting the blurry ones. Vince got pset. I deleted the only one he took of the naked mole rat. It was blurry! I couldn't tell what it was..I think I deleted about 20 pictures. We then headed back home. We decided to take 150 home which is the way both mapquest and yahoo suggested. On the way down, we took 231. Next time, we will stick with 231. We stopped at Pizza Hut in Linton for supper around 4:30 or 5. I definitely didn't want to cook when I got home!! We arrived home around 6:30 or 7 and started getting everyone ready for bed. I put the dark clothes in the washer and put our swimsuits with them. I was totally amazed when we were in bed at 8:40. Oh wait...it's time change weekend...make that 9:40. Ugh!

Here are some of the pictures I took at the zoo. I usually don't keep the file size as big as I did this time, but I didn't want to lose any of the quality of the pictures. Some of them are really awesome (like of the eagles, lions, etc.)

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