Our Lousy trip to San Francisco ZOO (Day 19)

This was the worst day of vacation. I really hate to complain on my blog because I barely have time to write the good things I want to remember. But just for memory sake I am going to write down how awful this day was, because I think I had awful terrible days when the boys were younger, but I can't remember many and one day I am going to need a record as proof so I can blackmail my kids.

It was terrible. Ginger started out not wanting to sleep the night before and was crying so hard that she threw up at 2 am. Seriously--why was she crying that hard??? Especially when we were right there next to her (like we have been for the past 18 nights, having absolutely zero personal space)...totally frustrating!

My back still hurt. I could move around a little bit better, but bending down to pick up all the dirty laundry was not fun.

Rose was on a rampage the entire day-- not listening, arguing, being mean to everyone. The final straw was when Rose threw/poured her chocolate milk all over Ginger on the way to the Zoo and was smiling about it. I went Ballistic!!! I really, really try to not go over more then having an edge of irritation in my voice. But I had, had it. And the good thing was that was totallyIT for Nathan too.

Why for Nathan??? Because he spoils Rose. They have always been kindred buddies. He would do anything for her. Darin will to some degree, but Nathan, as always, has infinite patience for anything Rose does. Darin has at least gotten annoyed and irritated with her. We have had endless talks with the boys to stand up to Rose and not let her bully them, or manipulate them, etc. Darin has learned some, but now Nathan has. And that has made a huge impact on Rose, she no longer has someone to turn to for comfort. In fact most of the rest of our trip Nathan was enforcing Rose to be polite more then us. He catches everything.

Anyway after I parked the car (I was in the middle of driving when the milk incident happened) I just tried to concentrate on taking care of Ginger. Seriously, that's how mad I was. Rose was lucky I had so many distractions and I am grateful I did too, so that way I didn't have anything to feel sorry about later.

Rose just had to sit in her car seat and fold her arms for the 20 minutes or so it took to take care of Ginger. Rose knew that her entire immediate world was extremely mad at her. We got Ginger cleaned up, good thing she threw up on everything the night before because I had the whole trunk filled with dirty clothes. I was able to find some reasonably clean clothes to put her in.

Then Rose and I had a very serious talk about how I was not going to take her anywhere fun ever again unless she changed her attitude and was nice. Rose knew she had been bad so she really broke down and didn't think I would take her to the Zoo. And I was fine with letting her think that. Anyway, I told her that if she did one thing wrong like not listening to me, or being mean to anyone we would leave immediately. No second chances or warnings!

And she turned her attitude around and was very well behaved the rest of the day! You could see she was still stormy and sad within herself. But she came when I asked her to come, and talked nicely to everyone.

And you know what...I have decided...I can live with that! I have always wanted happy, bubbly kids. I've never cared if they made a ton of noise, bounced off the walls, or were wild. But I just wanted them to be nice! It felt like I had an epihpany...I can live with having a serious, pensive, strong-willed girl...who cares about happy and bubbly...so long as she is nice!

So after this HUGE breakthrough. Which duh! Enforcing more limits actually has made her happier.

We went to the Zoo. We have unanimously voted the San Francisco Zoo the LAMEST Zoo we have ever visited. It was so bad that the boys said it wasn't even worth paying ANY $$$ to go to. Why??? Because the best animal exhibit of the whole zoo you can see before you enter. Here it is:




The 2nd best exhibit...Gorillas. There really are monkeys in this picture other then mine:-)

And he wonders why I call him a Monkey, he is practically the same size.

So, this is why I hated this Zoo. They have iron fences to keep crowds away from their black mesh fences that are hard to see through. Especially when you are down in a stroller.

Most of the time the kids had to climb on the iron fence to see over the mesh fence. And it got even worse because at stroller level there would only be an 8-10 foot wide space that wasn't completely blocked off by metal panels or plantings. It was like they had a zoo, they just didn't want kids to see the animals.

Thankfully, Ginger was a little tired and fairly content even though she couldn't see many animals.

We walked past this bench with a plastic monkey on it and Nathan totally jumped and got startled. It was hilarious!

He maintains he wasn't scared, just shocked.

Another exhibit Ginger couldn't see because there were about 10 stairs down to it and no accesibility. At least there were monkeys in this one instead of the other huge outdoor exhibit that we walked 1/4 of a mile to see it up a maze of ramps only to find out they had no monkeys when we got to the top.

Do you see how te fences are practically the same height as a 9 year old (and he isn't on the short side either)? This is one of those places that has the open sections to see through the fence but then the rest of the whole exhibit will be covered over with panels.

Rose loved the Flamingos though. She called every bird a flamingo.

There was a children's zoo, that had farm animals, insects, muskrats and a few other animals. As usual the animals were few and far between.

The most fun Ginger had was in the insect zoo. Possibly because she could actually see something. She had fun with this tiny little bench.


My Handsome Boy with the Hermit Crab


Smiling, because we finally found the train and they were able to sit. I am not kidding, we walked 3/4 of a mile without seeing any animals other then squirrels. The train is tucked all the way in the back and just so happened to be surrounded by completely empty exhibits. And I'm not talking exhibits where you can't find the animals, I'm talking empty concrete or dirt pads with just trash inside them. Or an aviary that is...you guessed it...CLOSED!

It was awful and after getting lost a million times because of course there are barely any signs and certainly none that point to the train. We finally found it! The only reason the boys wanted to continue was because we paid $4 a piece to ride the train. Seriously $4, most other zoo's only charge $1-2 to ride the train.

Here I am happy that we are going to ride the train. It's going to be great and the kids will think this whole day was worth it. HA!
The train ride was even lame. For $4 you would think "cool, it must go around the park." Yeah, it goes around a small park, it is so small that they do it twice (just in case you missed the vulture or the peacock) and you still finish in under 5 minutes. Because that's all there is in the tiny loop. Oh well, at least we can leave the zoo now!

Anyway, it was a bad, bad day! We finished it off with going to a laundromat. Then picked up Ken from work. So I could simultaneously rant, get angry (at him even though he wasn't even there), and cry about my whole day.

Thankfully, he is the nicest husband in the world and totally felt bad for me, apologized for anything and everything, then ordered BJ's onion strings and pizza for us and took us back to the hotel to go swimming.

We never should have even left because being at the hotel that night was the best thing in the world!!!