Today was a fun day, though. We went to Ikea and shopped for 3 hours. The first hour was a frantic rush to get most of the detailed things while the kids were all three in the play area. Then we had lunch and finished up. Since we returned home, we have been packing up a storm while the kids get their TV time. Now it's time for a break and then later a nice cool swim.
Okay, yesterday we planned to spend a couple of hours at this bird park we had heard so much about. Everybody says it's wonderful. It's a zoo but with just birds. Ummm, sorry but when I go to a zoo (which I try to only rarely do) the birds are the boring parts, the filler that you pass through quickly on your way to the lions or monkeys. This place converted me though. It's a well done zoo with all kinds of amazing birds. And they're not crazy about selling you stuff and they have a nice conservation message. Loved it. You'll see. Ted had the camera that day so he took a ton of interesting pictures.
Everyone was eager to enter the Jurong Bird Park ( http://www.birdpark.com.sg/ ), except Wyatt who was already complaining that he wanted carried. The entrance is gorgeous. Beautiful trees and orchids everywhere, very lush.
Drums for kids to make noise while their parents wait in the ticket queue. We got there 5 minutes after opening and there was no line! I get excited about these little things.
Because of Wyatt's early complaints, Ted had the brilliant idea to rent one of these wagons to pull the kids around in all day. It was only $15. We figured we would be more likely to stick around longer if the kids were happier. I figured we could have Ella pull it, so she did.
Because we bought a 3-in-1 combo pack that will allow us to go to the Singapore Zoo and the Night Safari later, they gave the kids these cute little hats. I think they liked them.
I was surprised to see the first exhibit is a penguin one. What? Some of them were outside but they had others in an inside area that I hope was climate controlled. It was a scorching hot day.
They had a place set up to have your picture taken with birds, but it wasn't open yet. Ted snapped a few with only the birds.
Flamingo Pond - Did you know flamingos get their color from their diet? Also, the zoo gives them food pellets that are supposed to brighten them up.
Hi there, old man.
That's Flamingo Lake in the distance. I just like this shot because it shows the trees and how covered they are with twisting vines.
Ella is still going strong.
Here we are waiting for the Birds of Prey show to start. Ella loves hawks and falcons so we were kind of ready to check them out.
A bunch of the show involved birds swooping over the crowds. It was really cool to see them in action up so close. We had to promise to remain seated and not to reach our hands up, but you can see in the picture that some late arrivers broke the rules!
Ella got tired of pulling. Zoe's turn. Ted and I ran off to get coffees. You know I'm kidding, right?
We liked the first show so much we decided to check out the second one that was about colorful birds I guess. This was also a great show, maybe better than the first. The kids needed a quick snack first.
This is Sassy the cockatoo and the kids liked her so much we bought a postcard of her. Sassy is one talented pickpocket as you can see in the video after this picture.
I loved these macaws flying through rings. . .
. . . so I took a video with my phone
We also cheered ours on in this race. His name was Barry.
My favorite was this parrot named Amigo who could talk. I missed recording him count to ten in English but I caught it in Mandarin. You can ask Lily if it's right.
and then he sang "Happy Birthday" to the few people in the crowd whose birthday it was. I have to say this is outstanding. If you're thinking you might take a pass on this video, rethink it. It's the best one.
As that show was ending, it started drizzling rain. That quickly turned to a killer downpour. Guess who didn't bring umbrellas? We should know by now that we should bring an umbrella anywhere we go in Singapore, but instead we just got wet. Eventually, we decided to hang out under a shelter or two, but mostly we just got wet and lived with it. The kids handled it better than we did.
We checked out a bunch of colorful birds that I will show you here without interrupting for commentary.
Oh, except to say that we got to feed some of these birds. Fun! Ted made a friend in this bunch too!
One of the spectacular features of this park is that there were so many aviaries. We weren't just looking at birds behind enclosures, often we were walking among them. The gardening was breath-taking too. This last aviary is the African Waterfall one. Gorgeous.
At some point we stopped for lunch and the rain stopped too. Usually a mid-day rain will cool it down nicely but today it made it steamy. It was eerie walking around in big fogs of steam coming off the ground. It didn't take us long to work up a sweat and decide to head for the water play area. When we got there, Ted and I were immediately disappointed that we hadn't brought our own swim suits. This place was a lot of fun.
Ted captured some of vegetation as we were exiting.
The kids were very excited to pick up these rocks and get their pictures taken with them. Whatever makes them happy.
and the Ben and Jerry's cow, too
Can you tell they are mooing in this picture?
Thanks for checking out the blog. I'm heading out for a swim now. Tomorrow is the big move. I'll try to capture it in pictures if I can remember where I packed the camera. Talk to you soon.
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