Lion park

One half month down, two and half more to go. The weeks have been passing quickly...that doesn't make me happy...  We finished last week with our meeting on Friday then visiting with the young people of the congregation then Sunday after the meeting we went and watched our first rugby game with some more friends. Ireland pummeled England into the ground...it's a game I think I could get into.

This week on Monday the circuit overseer from the Shona side wanted to: one.. Feed us roadrunner and two take us to lion and cheetah park here in town. He told us to be ready by noon on Monday, his day off for our field trip.

First we finally got to check one more thing off our list of must dos...riding in the back of a vehicle! And being in a car load of black Zimbabweans it's least likely we'll be ticketed...don't ask..it's just the way. Anyways we go and have a fab lunch of rice, noddles (yep two heavy starches), baked pumpkin and roadrunner...or a underage chicken.. Ha At about two we pile in the CRV and head out of town, south towards Bulawayo. Now Zims weather is a lot like Michigans, one minute it's hot and wonderful the next it's a down pour where everything you're wearing becomes soaked in about two minutes.. This was one of those occasions. Another thing off our list, playing in the rain... Huge rain drops. The park was a completely empty, and the walkways were now rivers. The first part you drive through with the car to see the lions, sadly the cheetahs do not survive well in captivty and are now gone.you then park and see some in enclosed areas here some guys nicely gave us umbrellas to use while we walk around the enclosed areas.  We still got drenched beyond saving, our shoes were worthless. 

I have been to a lot of zoos, but this was amazing. I have never been so close to a lioness before today and most likely until the great day won't again. She was beautiful, her hubby was massive! They were all out in the rain getting cooled off so our photos came out great. They have more lions then I could count, both regular and white ones. We are going to a few more parks but they are mostly nocturnal we didn't want to lose out on seeing them up lose. Normally they have Cubs you can hold but they hadn't had a litter in a while and I asked about the teenage one but they have me a crazy look...ha 

They have hyenas, baboons, elephants {which didn't come out to play}, giraffes, tortoise {his name is tommy and he's over 300 years old}, zebras,water buffaloes, eland antelope, kudu, wildbeests, impalas, and Nile crocodiles..yes we saw all of those. It was a great day, the older couples were pulling out the phones for photos even though they said to keep windows up we were passed that.. With the rain it was hard to see out the windows so we have to do something to get our $7 worth. Best money we've spent so far for sure. 

The locals always know where to go, because this park is not on any guild list or book. So if you are thinking of going and exploring the world make friends with those who live there, they will take you to the best places. 

Now with the down pour that lasted over an hour and the land being clay we had a bit of flooding..thank goodness we had the CRV and not the baby car the co drives. We took on some rivers while going through the game area. It felt a bit like Jurassic park with the thunder and lighting and green forest around us. 

As we drove home of,course the rain ceased and we got home in time for tea and cake so our cold bones would warm up before our cold ride home. 

Such an amazing day seeing all Jehovah has made for us, and the company we enjoyed was stellar.