Day 332

We started out the morning in Philadelphia. We went to the Magic Gardens to see the mosaic sculptures.

Later, we went to New Hope, PA to see the unusual shops they had there. There was a lot of beautiful scenery in this unusual town.

Day 247

Yesterday, I mentioned I had a surprise reason for coming to Chincoteague that isn't just the beach. Today, we started off by going on a pontoon cruise of the waters between Chincoteague Island and Assateague Island. On Assateague Island live wild ponies. It's thought that the ponies arrived on the island due to a shipwreck of a Spanish boat. The ponies swam ashore and have generationally lived there since. Assateague Island is split by Virginia and Maryland. On the Virginia side, where the ponies are is protected and humans can't interact with them. However once a year (in a few days actually) The Saltwater Cowboys (the volunteer fire fighters) round up some of the ponies and auction them off to raise funds for the fire station. They have been doing this since the 1920s. On the Maryland side, they occupy a beach area that is open to humans. Once again, like the other beach, it's maintained by the state and doesn't have hotels along it because it's wetland. You will see photos from both sections of Assateague Island.

Starting with the boat tour...

These ponies are free to roam on several acres of land. The boat can only come so close to the shore. There were lots of them farther away from the shore line, but those photos aren't as clear. These two ponies were separate from the herd.

I forget what kind of birds these are, but they swim under the water to catch fish and sit up on these posts to dry their wings.

We got back on shore and changed into beach clothes, to head to the Maryland side. While on the way to the hotel, we stopped to let this duck family cross.

On the Maryland side, things are much different. These ponies were grazing on the sides of the road. They are very docile, but since they are wild animals, of course we didn't attempt to interact with them.

My two favorite travelers and the beautiful clean beach. Since there are no hotels, there is a lot less trash! Delightful!

This one was about two feet away from the car.

Day 174

Today was a long day. We went to Disney Animal Kingdom and Disney Magic Kingdom. I took the most photos at the zoo, since it has the most animals and plants.

Bamboo

Palm

Duck floating on a small pond full of fish

Duck

Hippopotamus

Vulture

Meerkat 

Male gorilla with baby

Yellow flower petal on metal of swinging bridge

Silverback gorilla

Giraffe

Butterfly

Flower in butterfly garden

Komodo dragon

Giant flying fox bat

Flower buds in leaf pod

Huge bird

The world's largest pigeons. They were about the size of turkeys. This is a male and female making a nest. They are so used to people, from interacting with them in the aviary, that the male picked up nest material a few inches away from me.

Parrot maybe?

This might be a bird couple or an adult and junior bird.

Birdy belly

This anteater was taking a shower. It was scrubbing it's self and really enjoying the water. This was an unexpected sight.

Turtle

Pink flowering vine

After lunch, we went to the Magic Kingdom. By the time we had walked around for a few hours, I was exhausted. I didn't take a lot of photos, while we were there.

Sun rays through the clouds

After about an hour at the park, rain started pouring. After it had stopped, these white birds were standing on the canopies for vendors.

Yellow flower near the dock to go to Tom Sawyer's island.

Lizard

Rabbit

Pink rose

Sunset

Sunset from the boat headed back to the cars.

Day 173

Today we stayed at the hotel most of the day. We encountered a lot of animals.

The turtles were easier to see today.

There were lots of lizards around the hot tub. They weren't attracted by the water, but by the stacked rocks around the tub. They are all the same type of lizard, but different colors. We realized that this type of lizard changes colors.

After dinner, we walked around the hotel grounds to see what other neat things we could find.

This is a male and female duck. We didn't see any females yesterday, so she was new.

Palms

Purple flowers

These white birds were busily eating from the plants. I suspect there were insects or worms among the leaves.

Squirrel!