Insectropolis

We discovered a little gem hidden away in the New Jersey town of Toms River called Insectropolis! OK, so Patsy may not think it was the most wonderful stop on our nationwide tour, but the rest of us had a ball with all the bugs!

The first activity we took part in was a little talk and touch time with a guide at Insectropolis. We heard about and touched a hissing cockroach, a giant millipede, a Chilean tarantula and an emperor scorpion. Patsy of course is on less then friendly terms with spiders, so she was not super happy about meeting up with the tarantula.

Insectropolis is part bug zoo and part bug museum. The highlight of the day for me was seeing a huge bird-eating tarantula gobble up a hissing cockroach. You can see the big, bad spider in the video below. We also confirmed that a spider we saw in Virginia was a black widow. This was also less than stellar news for Patsy. While there are several types of live bugs to see, our youngest boys enjoyed playing like bugs in the termite tunnels! Acting like a bug is always the funnest way to learn about bugs.

If you ever find yourself near Toms River, New Jersey and have some bug loving kids in your family, consider stopping by this most unique zoo we have ever seen.

Discovery Place

Our annual museum membership gave us free entrance to this nifty little museum called Discovery Place in downtown Charlotte. We always enjoy these hands-on museums since we have lots of tactile learners in our family!

We watched a demonstration on things that glow, otherwise known as luminescence. Most of the boys got to take part in some sort of volunteer help with this show (see video for Tanner and the water that glows!). Chase even got to take a close-up look at a glowing emperor scorpion.

We played with bbs, laid on a bed of nails, diverted water, watched a rock eating fish, touched some underwater animals, watched a dorky documentary on dolphins in 3D and took a turn at family tug-of-war! We had a great afternoon of exploration and Discovery at Discovery place!

Charles Towne Landing

Our family visited Charleston, South Carolina a few years ago and we really fell in love with this old city. We visited several sites in the area, so this time around we have tried to see some of the sites we did not see before. And of course we need to pick attractions that are either free for us or very cheap. Previously we visited Fort Sumter, Patriot's Point and Middleton Plantation, along with a carriage tour of the "Holy City." Pretty much all of the main attractions.

So what is left to see in Charleston? Our first attraction we visited was Charles Towne Landing. This state park is located on the original site of the British settlement, called Charles Towne back in 1670. The park has a small zoo area with some animals that were once native to this area. Some still are a part of the local ecological system. We were very fortunate because several of the animals were playful. The otters were swimming and wrestling, the puma was stalking and the black bear was wresting a huge pipe. Nice to see animals in the moderate spring weather.

The park was alive with blooms of azaleas and other flowers, so Patsy was busy expressing her artistic side, trying to capture the essence of every bloom in America! It really is a beautiful campus. There are lots of things to see at Charles Landing, but one of our favorites is a recreation of a 17th century trader boat named Adventure. The boys were recruited by the interpreter to hoist the anchor, pump the water and steer the ship. This type of craft was a small merchant ship from the era, with a crew from six to ten. Not exactly pirates or John Paul Jones, but fun and educational still.

Jekyll Island

This post has been deleted because it is in our new book entitled Napkin Dreams. It can be found on Amazon.com

We also camped at the Jekyll Island Campground, here is the review:

Staff - 7 - Campground hosts and employees were helpful and professional.

Natural surroundings - 8 - Lots of trees and close to beach. Plenty of squirrels and unfortunately lots of gnats! 

Facility Fun - 5 - Planned activities, bike trail, bike rentals, fire rings at each site.

Facility usefulness - 9 - laundry, propane, exchange library, camp store and decent wifi for free.

Cleanliness - 7- Had a state park feeling mixed with a snowbird campground. Clean yet rustic.

Nearby attractions - 8 - Plenty to do on the island.

Value - 8 - Paid $32 a night for a back-in dirt pad site with full-hook-ups including cable.
 
Overall - 8 - We really liked this place but the gnats stunk. I do not suppose they are on site all year long!

John Pennekamp State Park

Our third night in the Florida Keys was spent at another state park, John Pannekamp Coral Reef State Park. We were so blessed to find another state park in the Keys to stay at. This particular state park is mostly underwater and daily boat trips for snorkeling and scuba diving adventures are part of the opportunities for visitors to the park.

There are also a couple of places closer to shore where you can go snorkeling and Blake took the chance to snorkel out to some sunken cannons that were located about 100 feet from the shore. This was his first time snorkeling outside of the swimming pool, so he was pretty pumped about the chance to see some ocean dwelling creatures, even though it was a bit of a rainy and cold day.

The weather also did not stop our boys from spending some time at the beach here. In fact they also put on their goggles and saw some fish. At our beach some ibis decided to swim with the boys! Not everyone can say they have swam with ibis!

The visitor's center at the park has a huge aquarium and several smaller aquarium that display some of the underwater life located in the nearby coral reef. No matter how many zoos and aquariums we visit, our guys always get super excited when we go to a new one and this aquarium was no exception. The unique and colorful fish really brought out the excited voices in our kids.

During our stay at the park I did a night-time run to a local eatery called The Fish House where we got some Conch Soup and Conch Fritters. Patsy and I enjoyed tasting some of the new-to-us foods! We are truly getting a taste our this huge country of ours.

Our review of John Pannekamp State Park.

Staff - 8 - Nice rangers and campground hosts.

Nearby attractions - 10 - Close to Miami and Key Largo.

Natural surroundings - 10 - Bushes and trees separate sites from each other. Ocean quite close.

Value - 9 - We paid $43 a night for a back-in gravel site with full hook-ups. Very cheap for the Florida Keys in winter.

Bathrooms - 8 - Modern and clean and plenty of them.

Roominess - 8 - Plenty of room for our rig, tow dolly and van.

Facility fun - 10 - Canoe and kayak rentals, nature trails, glass boat bottom tours, beaches, snorkeling, playground, aquarium, visitors center.

Cleanliness - 9 - Very clean and nice park.

Facility usefulness - 7 -  Dump, gated park, camp store, book exchange.

Overall - 10 - We loved this park!!

Orlando Science Center

This post has been deleted because it is in our new book entitled Napkin Dreams. It can be found on Amazon.com

Naked Mole Rat at Zoo Atlanta

I know it is sort of sick, but you know you want to watch it!!

Zoo Atlanta

We were very excited to receive free passes for our entire family to Zoo Atlanta! After a busy and hard week of volunteering at Hephzibah, we were happy to take a break on a Saturday and drive up to Atlanta for the day. We had some great weather for animals to be frolicking around, about 55 degrees and sunny!

We all had our favorite animals to see. Chase said he loved the monkeys, Brendan loved the bush dogs, David picked the naked mole rat as his favorite, Tanner picked the snakes, Blake was enamored by the ugly turtles, Patsy loved the Pandas and I thought the baby tigers were the bomb.

There were a lot of unusual animals including the family of panda bears which were quite adorable. We all did dig the naked mole rats who were quite active. The boys got to crawl through some tunnels into the  display and get the feeling of being one of the hairless wonders. They reminded us all a little of of dog Sherman with his male pattern baldness!

We had a great time watching the two toddler tigers play with each other and with their mom, who got a little mad at them and roared a very fierce roar at them! The gorillas were a ton of fun because of two little guys who were jumping on their mom's back.

We thrilled to see the elephants eating and chomping away and observe a zoo keeper handle and teach us about owls and armadillos! We visited the petting zoo where we all petted and brushed some goats and sheep. Patsy especially liked the smiling goat we met here!

Smiley Goat

There were many other animals to see and learn about and this is the perfect sized zoo for a family with little kids!

Carnegie Science Center

We continued enjoying our reciprocal museum membership when we visited the Carnegie Science Center in downtown Pittsburgh for free! This is one amazing museum and we wished we had carved out more time to spend there.

The first exhibit we made a beeline for was the robots exhibit. Here we got to see the robot hall of fame, play air hockey against a robot and watch a robot shoot hoops, among other things. This is a very cool exhibit.

Next we saw the aquarium exhibit where we explored undersea life with cameras, magnifying glasses and  close-up habitats! After this we went to an amazing show on electricity where our family was almost the lone guests for the show, joined by two gentlemen who let us have most of the fun! The boys all got to help first hand in this show, and so did Patsy, who was a source of great laughter. We loved this show and learned lots of things, and our favorite demonstration was the giant "lightning machine" that was loud and crackled with some huge voltage of electrical bursts.

The museum has an entire floor which is set up as a hands-on children's type museum. Here the boys sat in the earthquake cafe, pet a turtle, routed and re-routed water, made their own cartoons, and a host of other activities that put their noggins to work!

We love it when our kids get a mental workout and have a blast doing it! Thanks Carnegie Science Center!!

John Ball Zoo

So as we waited for some minor warranty to be done on Howard the RV in the tourist destination of Grand Rapids, Michigan, what is a family of seven to do without their home?? We bought the RV in Grand Rapids, but did not think through a situation like this.

We had been to several beaches over the past week, and we did want to pack a bunch of stuff in our van, so we looked for interesting options in Grand Rapids.We lucked out when I discovered the local zoo, John Ball Zoological Gardens, was on our reciprocal list! So we were in for a fun and free day! The John Ball Zoo is small, but just the right size for us and the weather was nice with a decent amount of clouds but no rain.

Our favorite exhibits were the parakeet (there were a ton of them) where we got to feed the little birdies and several of them landed on us, the baboon who was in a playful mood and the petting zoo where a goat kept trying to eat my zoo map and some pigs kept trying to eat Patsy's shoelaces.

We always learn some new animal facts with each zoo we visit. On this one we learned that elephants can't jump, kangaroos grow to be over six feet tall, and wallabys nurse their young even after they leave the pouch.

Henry Doorly Zoo

You can now read this post and much more in our new book Napkin Dreams! Click here http://www.amazon.com/Napkin-Dreams-ebook/dp/B00AZR24LG/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1358194928&sr=8-1&keywords=napkin+dreams