Virginia Safari Park

After visiting Monticello, we drove to Natural Bridge, Va to visit the Virginia Safari Park. This stop was totally for the kids, and they deserved it because they were so well-behaved at Monticello. The main attraction at the safari park was a 180 acre drive-through exhibit where you could feed the free-roaming animals. I thought that all of the animals would be smallish- like deer, ostriches, llamas, etc... These animals were there, but there were also some larger animals like elk, bison, and watusi cattle. Before entering, we purchased two buckets of feed. My dad drove so that the kids and I could all sit in the front and feed the animals. I let the kids choose which animals they wanted to feed, so we mainly fed the smaller animals. Probably the most memorable moment of the entire trip occurred when Olivia decided that she wanted to feed the bactrian (two-hump) camel. This surprised me because it was pretty big. We pulled up to the camel and stuck out the bucket of feed. It came over and started scarfing down the feed. I was a little concerned because I had only purchsed two buckets and I didn't want the camel to eat too much (and not have feed for animals later). So, I pulled the bucket back inside the car- and the camel came in after it. That's right- the camel had its head in my lap. The kids were delighted, but I was a little freaked out. I started shouting at daddy to drive- and he's like, "I can't- there's a camel head in the car". All of the commotion must have distracted the camel, because he pulled his head out of the car- and we took off. After driving throught the "safari" part of the park, we got out of the car and walked through the zoo portion. The kids especially liked the petting zoo. This park was lots of fun, and it was a good way to end the second day of our trip.