Well, Saturday has been marked up on our calendar for weeks now. Mom called me a few weeks ago to tell me that my Uncle Tom was going to be the Grand Marshal in the Chubbuck Days parade and we had to go and take pictures.
Then I saw a commercial for Zoofari, and I decided we were definitely going to that since we were going to be in Pocatello anyway.
Then our friends told us about the Duck Race and other festivities that were going on in Idaho Falls.
So I made out a schedule for the day to make sure we didn't miss anything. Let the good times roll!!
7:00 am - We were up bright and early to get ready to go to the Chubbuck Days Parade.
8:15 am - We were on the road on our way to Pocatello! It was pretty chilly and cloudy, and once we hit Blackfoot, it started to rain, so we were worried that it might be cancelled.
9:20-ish am - We pull into Chubbuck, and easily find the mall whose parking lot was being used to line up the parade people. When we drove by, we saw Aunt Karen and Uncle Tom standing around at the front of the line. We went and parked, and then walked over to say hi. It was drizzling and actually cold! (Chad was happy I made him bring a sweatshirt.) They showed us the car they got to drive in, and boy was it fancy! Mercedes-Benz convertible with heated AND cooled seats. (Not at the same time... though I wouldn't be surprised if it could do that too!) It was a $100,000.00+ car, and they had a lot of admirers checking it out before the parade started. (See the video!)
10:00 am - We walked down the parade route a little ways and found a place to scope out the parade.
10:30 am - By now it was pretty much raining. The parade finally started.
I have never seen people throw out so much candy! I was telling Chad though, maybe it was because we were relatively close to the top of the parade route, and it was not the nicest weather, so attendance was probably down. But we were showered with candy by pretty much every float. There was a little girl (maybe 6?) on one of the floats who looked at me (cuz I waved to her), zeroed in on me, and chucked a piece of taffy at my head with all her 6-year-old strength. You can see her in the video! She's riding in the little cars painted like animals.
Anyways - there was so much candy these boys stuffed each other's pockets.
What am I protecting from the rain? A baby? A puppy?
Nope! 2 rolls of free toilet paper from CostCo with attached one day passes to CostCo!!
I had to protect that toilet paper! We all know it's no good if it gets wet prior to use!
11:00 am - After the (short) parade, we found our way to Office Max because I had a coupon that got me Sharpie markers for a penny each, and it expired that day. After much deliberation, I picked out my Sharpies and they only cost me 3 cents and I have the receipt to prove it!!!
11:30-ish am - We stop at WalMart because Chad wants a snack, and we both have to use the bathroom. We make another amazing find at WalMart, but we're saving it for Christmas, so we can't tell you what it was.
12:00 pm - On the road to Idaho Falls for the festivities there.
12:30 pm - We get to Idaho Falls and find a table selling ducks for the upcoming duck race. We bought a duck for $5 and crossed our fingers that we would win something in the duck race at 3:45.
We walked around the greenbelt and watched some speedboats drag race on the river, and checked out the car show. (The pictures are mainly for you dad...)
2:00 pm - The Tug-of-War across the river. They got local football teams to participate, strung a rope across the river, and played tug-of-war.
Our team: The Shelley Russets
The other team on the other side of the river:
They had the police boat in the water to start the race - it went something like this:
(To our side of the river) Are you guys ready?
We're ready!
(To the other side of the river)
Are you guys ready?
Ready!
3-2-1 GO!!!
(3 seconds later) SNAP! and everyone falls over and the tug-of-war was over.
They took yellow nylon rope, tied two pieces together, and as soon as there was that much weight pulling on either side, it snapped right where it was tied and nobody won. ... Nobody saw that coming except us? Oh well - it was entertaining nonetheless.
2:10 pm - We set out in search of food that doesn't cost as much as carnival food. We call Mollie and find out that there is a Subway in the WalMart a couple of blocks away. We begin walking.
2:45 pm - We finally find WalMart and its Subway and order sandwiches. I have a flashback to being in Washington, D.C. when I was little and waiting hours for McDonald's hamburgers. Guess it runs in the family. But we did only spend $10.00.
3:15 pm - We find our way back to the Greenbelt because there's supposed to be a "Duck Egg Drop". We didn't know what this was and the description online wasn't that clear.
Watch the video below to see for yourself. (Egg Drop and Duck Race are the same video)
Yes, it ended up being a helicopter hovering overhead a big crowd of people and dropping thousands of ping-pong balls. Most were white, but some were red and all got you a prize. If you had more than one red, you had to give them away because the red balls got you better prizes. We gathered some white ping pong balls off of the ground after the general crowd had dispersed. We found out from the prizes that this was generally a children's activity - the prizes were snack size packs of skittles or oreos, and the red balls got you foam arrow shooters or bubbles. After finding this out, we didn't feel so bad about not getting any red balls. We planned to give away our white balls, but all the little kids seem to have their own fair share, so we kept them for souvenirs instead.
Just after the duck egg drop, we were waiting for the duck race to begin at 3:45. We saw that there was a firetruck parked in front of the duck race area, and they were letting little kids spray the fire hose at a wood cut out of a burning house. Now, how often do you get to spray a fire hose?!! I got in line with the little kids, and waited my turn for 15-20 minutes. Chad wandered over to the river at some point to make sure he got pictures of the duck race starting. (They drop the ducks out of the air.) Just like the circus, my little heart beat with anticipation at the excitement of spraying a fire hose. Every step got me one step closer to everyone's childhood dream come true! I keep looking at Chad because I'm not sure when the ducks are going to drop, and I'm getting closer and closer to the front of the line. Finally the kid in front of me is done, and it's my turn! The EMT controlling the fire hose was an older guy and he says "Who's next?!" And looks up at me. I say "Can big kids try it too?" He looks at me, looks at the next kid in line, and says "Come on up! Give it a try."
HE TOTALLY IGNORED ME! And I look behind me, and there were only two little boys behind me, and besides that, THERE WASN'T EVEN A LINE! I wanted to try it!
I waited for a second, with the thought that I would ask again after the two little boys were done - maybe he just didn't hear me - but I decided not to lest I be ignored a second time. And I didn't have a mom there to say "Uh, excuse me, my daughter was next. She's been waiting in line."
And unlike the let-down of the circus where I was a big girl, I may have shed a few girlish tears over the destruction of all my hopes and dreams when I didn't get to spray the fire hose. If he had said "Oh, I'm sorry, it's just for the little guys" I wouldn't have cared but to just completely ignore me?!! Jeese!
And in waiting to get my picture spraying the fire hose and trying to get a picture of the duck race beginning, Chad got neither. The pictures of the duck race beginning are off the internet. Neither of us was very happy.
We watched the duck race and cheered on our duck. The first duck over the falls won a Toyota Yaris.
Here I am with the car we won!!!
No... we didn't actually win it. But I sure wish we did!
4:30-ish pm - Got back on the road to go to Pocatello Zoofari.
5:30 pm - Arrive at Zoofari.
Now - let me tell you about Zoofari. We saw a commercial for the event on TV and decided we had to go. It boasted free ice cream, an entertainer, and face painting at the Pocatello Zoo for $6.00 a person. Now, as we drove there, we contemplated all the ways they could make it more lame than the commercial made it sound. Free ice cream only for kids - free ice cream as long as you only want vanilla - free ice cream as long as you waited in line for an hour at a time.
But - I give a million points to Zoofari. It met and exceeded all our expectations and made all of our dreams come true! You don't understand - I have been waiting for Zoofari since I first saw the commercial about a month ago. And today was the day!!
The zoo is a fenced off part of a park. It had buffalo,
coyotes, bears, lynxes, donkeys and cows, a petting zoo with goats.
and this little guy.
Chad (Charlie) with Charlie the bear who is 85 in human years and has arthritis.
It didn't have that much to see - but the admission wasn't that much. (It's usually $4.75/adult.)
View from the top of the zoo.
Now. We walk up to the gate, and they have two tables set up there for people to take your money. We pay our 12 bucks, and Chad says "Now, where do we find the ice cream?" Who are we fooling - we're here for the ice cream. The guy points up the walk (It's all on the side of a giant hill/mountain). We head straight to the first ice cream table. Pistachio or Butter Pecan. Whoa - are you serious?! Those are actually good flavors!!! But they were renamed to zoo-ish things like those pictured below.
There were several ice cream tables set up throughout the zoo (which was very small, so you only had to walk about 100 ft to get to the next table) with two flavors each. In all, there were 18 flavors of Dreyer's ice cream bliss, and two sundae tables. AND IT WAS ALL "FREE". (we did have to pay admission) Naturally we ate as much as we could without throwing up.
#1: Butter Pecan
#2 - don't remember
#3
Not sure
Raspberry Sorbet
#4
Raspberry Sorbet
Bubblegum
#5
Bubblegum - trying to chew the frozen gumballs
Rocky Road
#6
Rocky Road
Strawberry Shortcake
I topped out with 6, but Chad went on for a seventh.
#7
Mint Chocolate Chip
As we were enjoying our ice cream and scoping out the animals, we came to the coyote den.
I don't know if you can read this sign in this picture - but take note of what the title says:
We overheard the following conversation -
Mom: No _______, they're coyotes!
8-10 yr. old Girl: It says right there "A Living Paradox"
Mom: They're coyotes - there's no such thing as a paradox!
I guess the zoo people should be more careful about their signs!
Watch out for bears and paradoxes!
Here I am on the slide of the treehouse at the zoo. Letting my inner child out, thank you very much.
Anyways - so there you have it. We were only at Zoofari from 5:30-7:30 and it went till 8:30 but I couldn't convince Chad to stay and try to force down some more ice cream for another hour.
8:45 pm - arrived back in Rexburg.
10:00 pm - went over to the school auditorium to meet up with some friends and retrieve a book they bought us for ward choir the next day. (Thanks guys!) Final performance of the Idaho International Folk Dance Festival.
Home for bed.
It was a great day. Wish you could've been here!
1 comment:
I like how the kid ran for his life as you came down the slide megan!
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