Bayou Wildlife

While my mom was here a few weeks ago she was brave enough to get into the car with me with suitcase in hand. For another 3 hour tour… :) You would think she’d learn her lesson wouldn’t you? This one started off about the same. We had been planning to go see the Ballunivar Festival down at Nasa but at the last minute decided to hit the Bayou Wildlife Preserve instead. So we programmed the information into the GPS and off we went. A mere 38 miles…

When we arrived we got our requisite food to feed the animals in a plastic pot and proceeded to head in. With the windows down we rolled across the cattle guard right next to the animals. The very HUNGRY animals. Who proceeded to swarm towards my new car thinking they were going to get fed or maybe Connors little baby fingers if no other food were in the offering. Needless to say we rolled the windows up at warp speed as the ostriches and antelope closed in. ON MY NEW CAR!! EEEKKK! I am fairly certain someone failed to mention that part in the brochure…


Luckily with the windows up the animals seemed to take a hint. We eventually made our way to the parking lot and proceeded to park in front of the giant rodents, next to the mammoth alligator with the vultures ominously keeping an eye out for new arrivals…. No, I am not kidding. I have proof. See!!


Giant Rodents.

Giant Alligator.

And creepy vultures...

We made our way towards the pavilion as a tram departed. Deer mingled with the folks sitting down for a snack or early lunch. Ryan was even brave enough to pet one completely unprompted.

We took a quick peek at the giraffes just before the driver made her all aboard call for the next tram.

We grabbed our food and climbed in the back of the jeep. Our tour led us here and there past all kinds of animals eager to come help themselves to the food in the buckets, or in some cases the buckets themselves if you weren’t holding on tight enough. Some animals would come up and eat out of the buckets.

Others were a bit more shy and preferred the food be thrown on the ground a bit closer to them.

Ryan was happy to oblige.

Ryan was actually pretty good about throwing food to the animals. He would get a handful and hold it until we were close to them and then toss it out. Connor on the other hand would just grab fistfuls and would toss long after we had passed the animals. Though most of his "tosses" ended up in the back of jeep with us. :)

When we returned from our trek we sat down and had a snack with a very persistent deer, posed for some pictures, ran around like wild animals, then made our way to the petting zoo.

Ryan petted every goat in sight.

Connor finally worked up the courage to let go of me (with one hand at least) and touch the pig.

We made one last tour of the animals around the pavilion and then went down to check out the kangaroos, rodents, alligators, ostrich, and zonkeys before making our way to the childrens' barn for a horse ride, and glimpse of a peacock before heading out.

These were the zonkeys. Part zebra, part donkey maybe??