Fourth of July

We had a bit of a treat for the fourth! Chris, Holly, and Avery came down to San Diego to spend the weekend with us. We were lucky enough to have four days off so we packed about as much of Southern California as you can get into those four days. We went to the Wild Animal Park, the beach, Sea World, and spent the Fourth on a ship called "Ocean" that is the setting for a shark catching and researching show on National Geographic. It was a very full weekend!

The Wild Animal Park was fun, but it is out in the middle of the desert and gets very hot! We went at about Mid Day and spent the majority of the afternoon lost. It is a place that Jessi and I will have to go to a couple more times before we take anyone else there. The park is so big, and the animals so spread out that if you do not plan your trip appropriately you can spend hours there and never see anything at all. For some reason we kept going back to the center of the park and there was probably a forty-five minute stretch where the most exciting thing we saw was a petting zoo. But we finally got the hang of it and were able to see a bangle tiger and some napping lions. We never did find the elephants but saw the giraffes and the rhinos. There are a lot of opportunities to do some fun stuff at the Park but it was the Fourth of July weekend and there were some pretty long lines to get into just about everything.

For Sea World we played it a little smarter and went down at about three in the afternoon. They are doing summer nights down there right now so they are open until eleven. We got to see everything and went to the shows for the first time. Jessi and I have always skipped the shows in favor of the shorter lines and smaller crowds at the rides and exhibits, but after watching the Shamu show and the dolphins I was hooked. It is so cool to watch what these trainers have gotten the animals to do. And they do it so synchronized, with the music and each other. I will definitely take the time to watch the shows from now on.

For the Fourth Chris was able to get us onto the Ocean and it was the best place to watch fireworks from. You could see three shows really well. It was amazing. I have never been on a ship like that before. It was obviously a working ship, but very well maintained and clean. It was parked next to the Yachts in the harbor but I definitely felt more comfortable on the Ocean then I would have on one of the yachts!

The beach was awesome, as it always is. Holly, Chris and I kept trying our hands at body surfing but just ended up getting beat up by the waves...I think Holly was getting it towards the end but Chris and I didn't seem to have the hang of it. Avery loved the beach and she played in the sand and was sooo excited about just running her hands through it. It was invigorating to watch her discover it and see how amazed she was. All in all an Awesome trip!!