Travelog for: Fllama

Today we visit a friend's house.  He has something called Wii, it's for playing games. 

You play the games with a console.



We are playing a game of tennis.



I try my best but I don't think I am very atheletic!  Afterall, I have very short arms and can't really swing.  Floppers wins the game!

Today we went to the Dragon Boat Festival at Haulover Park.

We sit down on the shore to watch the races.



When we look closely, the rocks have shells in it.  Very interesting!



We wonder if we can spot any fish in the water. 



The boats are lining up at the start line, though you can barely see them.



Look here are the boats racing towards the finish line!  We cheer for our host's team.



Hmm, this is a serious camera used to take close up of the races.



We walk around the park a bit. 



There is a booth selling kites.





This booth sells a lot of dancing puppets.  I try to do the dance too but my legs are too short.



Oh this look delicious!



Argh we got ensnarled by a big spider web!  Actually this is part of a boy scout camp gateway.  We have a lot of thing climbing it, though I am not very good at this sort of things. 



They have an eggroll eating contest.    It is fun to watch as the contestants try to shove the eggrolls as fast as possible into their mouths.



Then we watch a bit of the taiko drumming performance.

Today we go to Haulover Beach.  Which is a clothing-optional beach... which, in simple terms, is nude beach!! Well, part of the beach is, and as our host told us it's rude to go taking pictures there, we decide to just stay on the other side.

Here's the little walkway to the beach.



Wow this is a wide beach w lots of sand.



A bit windy.



We all sit and sun bathe together.  Floppers wants to take off his clothes but we stop him.  I don't care for a nude bunny.

Today we visit a shopping mall called The Village of Merrick Park.  It is an upscale place with famous names like Jimmy Cho, Tiffany, Neiman Marcus and the like.  I don't know who they are but our tour guide (ahem, our host) said they are famous so I suppose they are.  I think they make shoes and diamonds and things like that?

Anyway, this is a pretty place.  At the entrance we pass through a little bamboo gate and that gets tibipanda very excited. 



I have to pull him very hard to get him away so we can take some pictures.  I like this clock tower.



A very pretty mall indeed.



Let's do some shopping!  ahem, window shopping.



They have a garden in the center with lots of sculptures.  Like this weird bird.



And this lady.









We are tired!  Let's take a rest.



Good, a boat!  We can get a ride home!

Today we visit the Fort Myers beach, where the American Sandsculpting Festival is held.



When we arrive, some of the contestants are still working on their sculptures.





This is a scary snake!



This is the second place winner.  It's a really nice sculpture of wolves and eagles around a mountain.



Now this is a serious sand castle!



And this is a futuristic castle on the moon.



This is the third place winner:



Though I like this moon better, with a sweeter face.



This is my favorite, I like how the hair looks like it's floating.  I give it my vote.



This is another of our favorite, a mermaid with a lot of sea creatures.  It wins the Committee Choice Award.



Here's Santa w a funny face!



Phew, all the sun is making me tired.  We decide to get a coffee blended drink.

This weekend we visit Downtown Disney, in Orlando, Florida.

First we check into the hotel. 



Look what we find on the bed!



This is the folder we receive when we check in.



We see a picture of Mickey Mouse on the wall.



The hotel is decorated with a sports motif.



In the courtyard, we see Donald Duck playing tennis and join him for the game,  He doesn't look too happy though.



So we decide to play baseball with his nephews instead.



I guess people can get really thirsty after a game.



We take the bus to Downtown Disney.  We meet this dinosaur, or what remains of it, outside a restaurant.  Boy, I guess the people are really hungry to eat a dinosaur!



We see a dragon in the water.  Oh, it's only made from Lego bricks!



We try our hands at Legotown, but I don't quite know how to build a dragon. 



Next we try Mr Potato Head, but I can't say we do much better.



I am glad someone knows how to fix him right, and I am glad he doesn't know how we mess up his face.



We also meet his friend Buzz Lightyear. 



We see this merry-go-round.



We get lost, but Donald and Donna are nice enough to point us the right way.



We visit the Disney Art Gallery.



Look, the brooms are around to keep the place clean!



We rest a bit at the Pooh Corner, and share some honey before heading home.

Today we participate in a walk to raise money for organ transplants.



The walk takes place in a zoo, so we are all very excited.  Mocha is pretty sure that Florida is too hot for a moose, and our host is pretty sure there is no panda here for Tibipanda, as "I would have known if there were one".  But maybe they have a llama?

I wonder what the birds are lined up for?



We see a lot of flamingoes.



We see an elephant!



And some lions. 



We get a ride on a kodomo dragon.  But it's not real, because we are told that the real dragons are very fierce animals who will finish me in one gulp!



A camel!  I ask him if he knows where is a llama but he doesn't know what a llama is. Stupid camel!



And a camel ride!  Again, not the real thing. 

 

This is a Gaur, the largest wild cattle and comes from India.  The bull has very beautiful horns and can weight over 1500 lbs.



We see some gorillas.



Since the giraffe is so tall, I ask her if she spots any llama in the zoo.  Sadly, she says she hasn't seen any.  What a disappointment!



While we don't see any panda, we see some bamboo, which Tibipanda attacks immediately.  Maybe we can just leave him here as an exhibit?



Well, bye bye alligator!



We finish the walk in 1 hr, 18 min and 9 sec!



Now we will get a press penny for souvenir.

While I am a bit disappointed that we didn't see any llama at the zoo, my host has a nice surprise for me. 

She has sponsored a little girl from Peru!  We receive a letter with her picture.  Her name is Victoria.



We write a letter to her, and also send her a set of finger puppets.

Well, it's the end of the year, and I will be leaving for Australia soon, but today we go to the Mango Strut Festival in Coconut Grove.  It's a parade that put the "nut" in Coconut Grove, as participants plays parody to news events of this year.  It is a really fun, silly event.



First we see some jugglers:



Here is Sarah Palin w her First Dude and a moose.  She carries a big shopping bag and a sign for 2012.



This is the Mangobama band.  The theme music is in the video and at the end of the parade everybody dances to the tune.



Here are the Somalian pirates who go around hijacking other floats.  They kidnapped Sarah Palin too.



Here comes the float with the Little Miss Mango contestants.



Unfortunately we don't have pictures, but there is a guy wearing a mask of George Bush, and people offering shoes for the audience to throw at him.  The lady next to us must really hate him, as she throws the shoes three times.  They all miss though.  There are also executives with a mug and sign "Brother, can you spare a billion dollars?" and an Uncle Sam giving out bailout money.  There are killer tomatoes running around, a "Mother Earth" with IV, a "economy" crippled in a wheel chair.The Illinois Govenor is here trying to sell a chair; Joe the plumber, along with Josephine, Joanne and all the plumbers marching with a toilet plug.

As our camera runs out of battery so we don't get as many shots as we like, but here is a Youtube video that captures the event really well:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=10EZkaBLcyo

Hey mom! I have arrived in Australia... well I arrived late last night but Sara was too tired and hot to come on and update me... they had just gotten back from a huge trip to Sydney... which I heard Brunswick got to see... but this one was bigger... hopefully we'll all be going back next month around this time...

Until then it's over 100'f here right now and I think I'm going to lay down with Sportie and try to cool down before another hot day tomorrow... write again soon mom! :-)

Remember when I said it was really hot? Well a couple hours later Sara heard one boom of thunder and that was it... it was POURING down rain... I cannot believe how quickly the weather can change here...


It was actually flooding down the street because of how much rain and wind was happening. Sara forgot to close some of the windows in her house - particularly the kitchen window and the floor looked like it had a small pond in it. Pretty insane...

...but just as quickly as it ended it was done and there was a very bright rainbow greeting us... very pretty! I'm just glad it was able to cool down a little bit...


...sadly it didn't last and the next day was even hotter than the day before. Not good the drastic changes in the weather, I'm feeling a bit stuffy because of it... hopefully we don't get a cold from all that... that wouldn't be a good way to start my vacation would it?

Today we stayed up really really really late. It was around 530am before Sara went to bed and we went to bed around 430am thankfully we were all so very tired... but we stayed up because at 4am, Mr. Obama was turning into the first African American president. President Obama now... a pretty awesome thing actually. Three of the five tv stations were showing it live from Washington DC... a lot of it I found to be pretty boring but when it finally ticked over to 4am, it got a lot more interesting... :-)

Around 3 or 330am they had a whole bunch of people walk out and then they had president elect Obama walk out...


After a lot of talking and speeches, and singing they inaugurated vice president Biden...



...and then it was finally the time... even 5 minutes late... the inauguration of President Obama...



...after the inauguration we watched his speech. He's such a lovely speaker isn't he?


Well you might ask why Sara stayed up that late just to watch that... well, I didn't know this before but Sara was born and raised in America and is an American citizen... so she's very proud of her country for electing such a fine man and watching history itself... it's an amazing thing isn't it? :-) She's very proud to be American sometimes. :-) Well I'm off to bed it's been a long night... :-P

Sorry I've been away for a while... it's been VERY hot here in Australia. We've been hitting some record temperatures almost every day the last few weeks. Kind of crazy... it even got up to 47'C in some areas (around 114'F in South Australia) there have been lots of black outs and the air conditioners don't seem to make much difference. Were kind of hoping for some rain soon... but Sara got a notice that she's got a house inspection coming up... so she's been cleaning the house - one room each day for the last few days. She spent around 3 hours on the kitchen last night, and today she worked on her room... it was a bit crazy..

We all decided we could help a little bit... although not much because some of the chemicals are pretty nasty and she was up on a ladder much of the time... but once it was done we decided to help her put her room back together...

...that's just after the cleaning when she's ready to start putting everything back together. The only things in the room were the wardrobe and the bed frame. Everything else was scattered through the hall and living room. It looked pretty packed... haha

Now we've started to put it all back together... the picture above the bed, the bed and the slats under the bed are together now... sadly we couldn't help much more than being on the side lines. That stuff was pretty heavy actually...


...and now everything is complete... how does it look?


...I'll be updating much more soon, more so if it cools down where we can go outside without feeling like we are in an oven... but hopefully we'll see some sights soon. Maybe even a trip to Molong but there will be a Sydney trip coming up soon... maybe even two... :-) We'll see how that goes! :-) Write again soon!

Today we found out that we now have a resident spider visiting in Sara's house. Sara is a bit used to it - they're harmless I can assure you. They are good to have around because they kill all the nasty other bugs (like red backs and white tip spiders)... they usually keep to themselves. Sara is always very wary of where they are, as she doesn't really like spiders. But there is always one each Summer, sometimes more... well here I am with the spider... it's pretty big isn't it? It's a Huntsman Spider. ;-)

Welcome to Australia right? :-P

Here's a close up of him, its hard to tell by the pictures but he's bigger than me... :-)


I'm kind of glad he's keeping to himself... we also have a resident mouse in the house too since Sara's husband Daniel left the door open one day. He's found his way into the mouse mansion (where she has five mice in it)... so it's been interesting this Summer lol. Write again soon!

I only had a short journey to Orange because Sara saw an opportunity for me to see more of Australia and after getting confirmation with my mom... I got put in a post bag to Queensland. If me and my new friend Leonard make it in time (the 10th of February) we'll get to see Australia Zoo. ;-) How exciting! I'll write again when I get up there! Miss you mom! <3