25 in 25: #7 feed the zebras

billy the billy goat #1

#7's adventure took place at fossil rim wildlife center. a close friend, kelsey, and i took a spontaneous day trip to glen rose, tx. i have always wanted to play with the long necked giraffes and meet the mascot of my favorite childhood gum, fruit stripe. (the sugar-filled, striped gum that came with a tattoo on every wrapper. what kid wouldn't love zebras after that?! good work fruit stripes!) before we left, i took a look outside and unfortunately it wasn't the nicest of days. dark clouds were rolling in and the humidity levels weren't playing around. being a fossil rim newbie, i called ahead to make sure the park would still be open. the woman who answered informed me that the park is open rain or shine, which was great news! i then asked if we would still be able to see all of the animals. she responded with "well of course you will still see and be able to feed them... they live there. where else would they go?" feeling like i asked the wrong question, i ended the conversation by thanking her for her time then packed up the car and headed to glen rose!

life-size!

once we got close, we saw a sign that read "dinosaur world next exit". without any hesitation, we took the next exit. being the only two unaccompanied by a parent didn't stop us. however, the time it would take to walk around the park did. so instead, we settled on exploring the gift shop and playing with the giraffes and t-rex they had out front. then, back into the car and onward to fossil rim!

the ostriches were the first animals we saw. they came right up to our car. i mean walked right up like they owned the place. it was actually a little frightening. i turned around and had one staring right at me. he was only inches away from my face and clearly invading my personal space. these guys were fearless. hungry and fearless. they gobbled up every bite of food we fed them and just continually stuck their heads through the window demanding more. while the tiny ostrich heads bobbed around trying to find the bag of food hidden in my car, i did my best to conceal any and all fear of these jurassic-like birds. slowly more and more ostriches started coming to the window. afraid we were about to start an ostrich riot, kelsey and i threw a handful of food on the ground to distract them as we made our swift getaway.

next we passed a number of goats, fed them and kept going. as we drove a little further, we ran into (ran into figuratively not literally) some more goats. then as we turned another corner, even more goats! i was starting to think we were touring a goat farm.

little foots cousin

billy the billy goat #100

wanting to stretch our legs and take a break from our goat sight-seeing tour, we made the stop at a petting zoo found along the trail. there we saw dinosaur tracks- looks like fossil rim had a little dinosaur world in it too. then, surprise surprise, we saw more goats! these goats were a little more fun than the others. kelsey and i instinctively reverted to our childhood petting zoo days and chased every animal until they gave up and allowed us to pet them.

it's a rhino!

the animals that excited me most were towards the end of the trail. we saw the giraffes locked up in a pen (because of the weather-- my question wasn't so silly after all). So we could only drive by and admire them from a distance. that was a bummer but what can ya do. then finally, the zebras! these guys were awesome. probably where we spent the most time and one of the only times we encountered other cars on the trail. they were such beautiful animals and looked just like the fruit stripe guy! and to end our trip, a rhinoceros! you weren't allowed to pet or feed the rhinoceros. i imagine he wouldn't have been too friendly. being as close as we were was good enough for me. the tour was long, but well worth it. it takes about 2 hours to go through everything. i learned i can be quite the chicken. i may have screamed a time or two. some of the animals popped up out of nowhere!! the company you have can make or break a trip like this. lucky for me, i was in great company! being that close to so many different animals (and so many goats) was pretty awesome. i could only imagine how beautiful everything looks on a nice sunny day and how cool it would be to feed a giraffe! perhaps i'll plan ahead next time for my fossil rim round #2 adventure.