safari part deux, belated

Now that I have half a chance to sit down and accomplish something while the boys are at school, I am heading back to vacation land of the first week of August. I am returning to the day I covered in this post, when we safari'ed in the morning, journeyed into the deepest caverns east of the Mississippi at midday then returned to the safari place in the afternoon. 

It was a very hot day. Before we entered the Natural Bridge Caverns, we sat and ate lunch outside. Toots said, "I will sit here, and you will sit there, and we can have a picnic!" to Mr. Cynic, who nicely obliged her.

I will eventually post some cavern pics, as soon as I have a good chance to go through them and single out a couple of not so dark highlights from Luray and this place. After a chill visit deep underground, we headed back to the Safari Village to walk around and feed some more animals. Thank goodness for all day leave and return tickets!

African Pygmy Goats and my somewhat pygmy teen

I can't recall the name of this primate, but he was way too hot. Can you see his tongue hanging out?

African Pygmy Goat. They tickled.

Hot peacock. I love peacocks. This guy found a rare piece of shade.

Here is where he found the shade - in Kangaroo land. This Red Kangaroo looked like a playah. 

What?

Take your picture and get outta here.

Lorikeets! They are loud and sound cranky. 

A friend of mine in Sydney talks about the racket they make often in his yard.

Squawkity squawk squawk!

What are you looking at? Squawk! 

Rainbow birds

Captain Comic was fascinated by the warthogs.

Hot Tigers.

Hot Honey and Toots

These box type turtles - sorry can't recall species - got very horny later and all three kids were like "ew!" and Captain Comic couldn't stop giggling while he was repulsed.

Different kind of llamas. Thank you, Mr. Cynic for humoring your sister.

And okay, your mother, too.

I wish I could have gotten this shot in full context.

Captain Comic walked up and the lemur jumped right at him to say hello.

Spider monkeys!

This giraffe was very disingenuous. But he still ate from our hands after he huffed indignation.

De Brazza's monkeys again, like at the other zoo earlier. 

They clearly did not want to be there or to have us look at them.

They do this cool thing where they turn from you and sit super still for hours at a time when they feel threatened. Hide in plain sight. 

You smell good to eat.

Tamarin monkeys are among my favorite. Creepy little humans.

After the overheated walk around, we got back in Bertha with Captain Comic in my old passenger seat from the morning. Why should I have all the fun just because the back windows don't roll down? Honey was ecstatic to sit in the air conditioning and drive around again.

Captain Comic was a little fearful, but thrilled to feed the animals.

Especially the large "raptors"

Just look at his face in the side mirror.

I love that kid.

He loves Emu.

And Ostrich and Rhea, too. 

In fact, he didn't want to feed anymore mammals after they pecked in his bucket, rather like dinosaurs.

Gorgeous Rocky Mountain Elk I fed in the morning.

Bison closer and in the shade after their morning plains walk.

I kind of forced him to feed the Elk. He was very intimidated, but I got him to pet the big guy.

Hello again.

Captain Comic ran off with my reference pamphlet since my last safari post. 

This was one of the Oryx. Jogged my memory hard for that one. 

Arabian Oryx

Wildebeast, I think.

Hotchatta-cha-cha Llama. 

And thus concludes our safari adventures in the mountains of western Virginia. Caverns coming soon.