Vacation Day 2-July 4th

N2 slept later than normal-until almost 8!  We left the Quad Cities heading for Omaha.  We decided to stop along the way at the Des Moines zoo which we had visited with N2 on our way back from Colorado 2 years ago.  We remember the zoo being small but nice.  It was HOT again (I think that this is the trend!)  The first thing Noah wanted to see was the "silly monkeys."  Luckily they were right at the front of the zoo.  This is a Macaque.

We got there right about 1:00 and they do giraffe feedings at 1:00!  We headed there after seeing the macaques and the bald eagles.  Sorry for the bad pictures of Natalie feeding the giraffe.  I had my zoom lens on so I had to really back up and she very quickly fed the giraffe before I was ready!

I asked N2 what their favorite part of the zoo was and at first Natalie said the hippo that sprayed water (it was a mister statue) but then I asked her which animal and she said feeding the giraffe.  Noah said the silly monkeys.  We saw a few more animals before we encountered a huge caterpillar statue.  What could be more intriguing than that?

Noah has become quite difficult to take pictures of because he will purposely turn away when he sees me pull out the camera.  No matter how much calling to him I do, he will not turn and look at me, especially when he is sleepy and tired which he was on this day (as well as Natalie).  We got a nice view of the prairie dogs.

And what's better on a 100 degree day than to go play at a playground?  Not much-N2 decided they needed to play.  Right around the playground was a pond of koi that you could feed.  This is what it looked like when you fed the koi.  Not the light yellow orange fish in the second picture.  I don't think it is touching water!  It was INSANE.

Here's a picture of N2 feeding the koi.

After the zoo visit, we got back into the car and drove to Omaha which Natalie called "Olmo-haw" (the beginning of the word sounded like Elmo but not exactly a short e sound) and just kept saying over and over again.  We went swimming in the hotel pool and N2 took forever to go to sleep on the sofa bed-2 1/2 hours later they were asleep!  But we did get them up to see all the fireworks out our bedroom window as we could see so many shows (and people's personal shows) all at once.  It was amazing!  There were even people shooting off mortars in the hotel parking lot.