Two Hams on the Road

Thursday, February 6, 2014

We just spent the day at Lion Country Safari.  It was nicely placed for a stop between the Everglades and Walt Disney World.  They have a KOA campground next door and tickets were included.  They have a drive through safari and apparently conditions were right as a lot of the animals were active, running and playing.  The two male lions even had an altercation while we were there.   There was a keeper in the area in a pickup truck who drove between them when they broke apart and visually separated them.  They each settled down with a female lady near by and all was well.

But most of the animals seemed frisky today.  The zebras were kicking up their heels and most animals were up and moving around, sometimes blocking traffic.  Even the chimpanzees were active.

The drive through part of the  park is divided into 6 sections.  The first section was labeled Las Pampas, named after grasslands in South America.  

 They had Llamas and storks

 Ostrich's cousin the Rhea, the South American Tapir (behind the white Rhea) and large Aldabra tortoise.  The tortoise around the park were especially active compared to what we are used to.

The Nile Lechwe were new to us.  From the Nile valley, the mature males are dark. The females are light.

Also new to us was the kulan from central Asia.  They look like donkeys and are a relative of the horse.  They can run up to 45 mph.

Here is one pair of the lions after their altercation.  All is well.

This was the sign as you entered the lion area, which was double fenced.  I don't want to be there when they have to close the gates.

We haven't seen any camels at zoos for awhile, but there were two here.

There were lots of ostriches, most of whom had their feathers all ruffled out.

  And the Watusi cattle were there.

 There was a large herd of white rhinoceros and one black one.

 They also had a large herd of frisky zebras.  I picked a picture that just showed one, as the group shots made me dizzy. Too many black and white lines!

The giraffes were too far away to get a decent picture.

After the drive through safari, we had lunch at the restaurant in the walk around area of the park.  There were other animal displays, more birds, parrots and flamingos.  We listened to one animal talk on flamingos and attended a small animal show, where we got to see a small hedgehog.  They are cute!

All in all a fun day.  Tomorrow we head for Disney!

Deb