VACATION Day 3--African Lion Safari!

Part 3! Yay! It's time to take a trip to the African Lion Safari! Sadly, this blog won't allow more than 100 MB videos. So, you will not be able to see our elephant ride... But it was fun! The Rices and Sierra went on a huge elephant named Jenny. Here we go!

Here's a sign telling us we're 30 miles away!

The lions were first... chilling under their roof.

More lions...

Here's the mama lion keeping watch... while taking a load off.

Cheetahs next. The only thing you can see is their eyes!

So, it's raining now... but if you look closely, you can see 2 or 3 monkeys eating snacks that were ILLEGALLY given to them from the car they are sitting on. The sign didn't say NO FEEDING THE ANIMALS for nothing. Luckily they got caught later on...

Look out! A rhino! Ally was scared it would come charging at us.

And now some peaceful zebras.

This is one of the elephants we saw in "The Elephant show," back in the park. (We also went to the other shows, "Birds Of Prey" and "The Parrot Show." They were each about 20 minutes of cool tricks! Very fun...

Here, Sierra's petting him. Eww, hairy.

And a chick that was stray in the bushes with her mother, the peahen.

There were also elephants swimming at the end of our day. It looked like they were relieved after a hot day.

VACATION Day 2--Wax Museum/World Records!

So, when the Rices and Andy went to the field to see the concert, Sierra and Mom went to the Wax Museum of Stars! Then across the street, there was a Guinness World Records Museum... and they have free "records" to see outside of it. So, we went there afterwards. But first, the Wax museum...

The Blues Brothers! "I'm a soul man!" (John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd)

Rainman! (Dustin Hoffman and Tom Cruise)

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles! Griffin would appreciate this along with these few coming up...

The Joker! }:D "BWAHAHA!" (Jack Nicholson)

Batman saves the day! (Michael Keaton)

The Obamas... these were the least real-looking. I mean, they are SHINY!

Forrest Gump. "Life is like a box of chocolates." (Tom Hanks)

Fatal Attraction. Ooh... scary. (Glenn Close and Michael Douglas)

Sierra playing quidditch with Harry Potter! (Daniel Radcliffe)

Rawr! It's the Twilight Saga! (Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart a.k.a Edward and Bella)

E.T. Phone Home!

Ace Ventura: Pet Detective. He looks kind of creepy here. (Jim Carrey)

The Wizard Of Oz scene--The Great and Powerful Oz

Sierra is now part of the Simpson family in this picture.

Hannah Montana... kinda.

Look closely... Who's missing a hand in this picture?

Here, Sierra's sitting in a hand at the gift shop you enter as you come out of the Wax Museum. Of course. A gift shop. What else?

Either Sierra shrunk or that chair grew! It's a giant chair!!

And the fun, overweight person suit to step behind. How exhilarating!


THAT'S A WRAP! Stay tuned for the next post about our African Lion Safari....

VACATION Day 2--Niagara Falls!

Here's part DEUX (I used the French word for two, since our trip was in Canada!) of our vacation! On the second day, we took a long drive to Niagara Falls, Canada! The whole day was packed with a bunch of cool sights and activities having to do with the Falls. Some things we did, we don't have pictures of, so to sum it up... We all got passes to do 4 activities that were included in the package. We went on the Maid of the Mist boat ride, went "Behind the Falls" (where you could stand on a platform right near the falls and get completely soaked), and some of us went to see a 4D movie called "Niagara's Fury!" It was great! We stood in a room with a screen all around us, water and "snow" (soap) would fall from the ceiling, lighting would flash, thunder shook the floor underneath us, and then part of it showed on the screen as if you were jumping over the edge of the falls while the floor tilted and shook! We all loved it! But, unfortunately Ansley was terrified and cried the whole time. It was scary! Especially for a 4 year-old! The last thing that was included with the pass was the "People Mover." We got to ride a bus around town whenever we wanted! It was a FUN day! Now here's some of the pictures we got...

Here's a fun picture of the stop sign we saw at the border! ARRET!

The great view of the Falls from the Canadian side! There was lots of fog from the evaporated water!

Another picture of the humongous waterfall with a Maid Of The Mist boat in sight! "Watch out!"

We actually got to go on one of the Maid of the Mist boats! It was fun and very WET!

Us-- after getting soaked! Good thing the workers hand out ponchos, huh?

We saw a rainbow right in the dip of the waterfall! And, it stayed there the whole day! Pretty, pretty, pretty.

Now doesn't this look like a sample photo you'd see on a calendar?

At one point, we saw two rainbows!

This is the view of Andy from the top of a car ride that takes you up a hill. The girls insisted we go on it.

Another beautiful shot of the Falls.

And after everybody stopped sight-seeing and everything got dark, there was a concert in the park! And following the musicians were some fireworks above Niagara Falls. They were great! But, not quite as great as Vernon's, "July In The Sky!" in my opinion.

This, surprisingly, is the view of the Falls from our hotel!

That's all for the falls... but there will be another post about a visit to the Wax Museum in Niagara!

VACATION Day 1--Pageant!

Finally, here's the post about our vacation with our good friends, the Rices. First, we all went to see the Hill Cumorah Pageant in Palmyra, New York. But, before it started we went to check out the Visitors' Center...

Here's the outside of the Visitors' Center

There was a huge table with a bunch of Book Of Mormons in all different languages! We had to take a picture of the Mongolian one, of course!Ansley, Sierra, and Ally posing with Joseph Smith.And, the whole Rice family, in front of the large Book Of Mormon.

Before the Pageant started, of course, we had to go buy some pageant potatoes!

Here's Ally smiling away with a nice worker at the food stand.

After we were settled in our awesome seats with food and bug spray, we waited for darkness so the Pageant could start!The Rices--anxious to see the Pageant for the first time!!

We always take pictures of some of the cast! Won't our friends be jealous that we got a picture of Emma Smith?! (Far right)

We were determined to see someone that we know there. And sure enough, we met some friends from the good old Ellington Ward--Donna and Mel Rowlands.

That's all for night 1--Pageant! Stay tuned for post number 2!