Day Six-Silver Springs

We left early this morning to meet Bruce and Marsel, Matthew and Caleb at Silver Springs-a Nature's theme park and Wild Water park. The kids were pretty excited to see their parents and their Uncles, too!

We took the glass bottom boat ride and it was fun to see it through the kids eys. Do you see the heads of three statues from the James Bond movie that I can't remember the name of! The last time we were here was with Bill's Mom in 1992! Bill and I felt that joy of seeing the full circle of life because we are now there with our children's children! Marsel and I stayed on the ground while everyone else went up for a bird's eye view of the area. Next we took a hike to the bird show. We sat in the shade and learned about hawks, eagles,

kestrel and vultures-all natives of Florida. There is a bird in flight here-can you spot it? (You might need to zoom in.........)

After a romp on the kids jungle gym, they took their own boat ride.........
The giraffes were beautiful but the stunch was overpowering in the heat--I mean like die from the lack of oxygen! From now on , I will only enjoy looking at them on TV-no kidding!

We took the wildlife jeep ride and saw lots of monkeys-both the caged kind and the wild Reeses Monkeys that have learned to come and visit the park at feeding time!

We left the park to eat our picnic lunch on the tables by our car-there was a 100' cypress tree right next to us that provided perfect shade on our 90 plus degree day. When all the lunch clutter was repacked, we took off for the water park. I do not have pictures because I left it in the car as it isn't waterproof! Abigail and I headed to the kiddie pool park while the rest of the group went to the big guy slides! We enjoyed about a half hour of swim fun when a storm blew up and they made everyone leave the water-we tried to wait out the storm but you have to stay out of the water after a sighted lightening strike and we gave up the waiting game after and hour! The kids were very disappointed (the kids of all ages!) to leave early but leave we did. Caleb added to the grand finale of the day by getting a flat tire on the way home!