Cold and sunny this morning, we waited until 10:30 AM before we headed out; first to WalMart to return some purchases then we went to the African Safari Adventure. This was somewhat of a bust. We were expecting something more like the place down in Eatonville where you drive your car through a very extensive network of roads with different animals in a dozen different areas or like the San Diego Zoo where you ride through the park in a high top bus.
Instead, there are a series of small enclosures you walk past with some monkeys, macaws and a few other species out behind the gift shop ticket area. Then you drive through a gate into a large savannah like area about an eighth of a mile square. Immediately on passing through the gate we were mobbed by several packs of small antelope, some larger elk, llamas, alpacas and what look like reindeer. They have come to the car because they know you have a large slurpee sized cup of feed pellets and probably a bag of carrots purchased at the gift shop. 
The animals have become habituated and you can’t leave your window down, you have to break off pieces of carrot and pass them through the partially opened window. Meanwhile the windows are getting a tongue washing from those crowding in for their share. At one point we were so surrounded that Tina couldn’t move forward. Eventually we passed beyond the initial onslaught and there were fewer animals vying for attention. As we came around a large berm covered with small “Dyk Dyks” we came face to face with several bison and some type of long horned cattle. The horns on these guys were so big you had to wonder how they could keep their heads up. At this point we were definitely up close and personal with some pretty big animals but not many from Africa. 
Our last sighting was some camels in a different enclosure about a hundred feet away and a couple of Zebras. The whole experience took about thirty-five minutes and for $42 quite disappointing. But you never know for sure until you go. Like my dad used to say about a bad meal, “It’s only one meal”. And this was only one experience among many out of our six months on the road. After this disappointment we went back to camp and spent the afternoon relaxing. To see all our photos click on the following link:
1 comment:
The absence of innuendos is almost deafening. ;-D
Post a Comment