Right Back Where We Started

In keeping with the deja vu theme, we're now back in Columbus, Ohio, our first stop of the RV trip.

We got here yesterday, after a four hour drive from Indianapolis. Shortly after we arrived at the Cross Creek Camping Resort, part of the Alum Creek State Park, we headed out in the Jeep to go to the Columbus Zoo.

Henry has been excited about this zoo for a long time.  It's the zoo that Jack Hanna, an animal expert, is from.  Henry was very excited to see that not only do they have a zoo, but also an aquarium, water park and amusement park rides.  Bonanza!

I'll let Henry write about the zoo in detail later, when he's over his obsession with the FIFA Soccer app on the iPad.  I'll just sum up that despite the heat, it was an enjoyable three and half hours at the zoo.  The polar bears were very active and fun to watch.  We also saw moose, black bears, elephants, rhinos, flamingoes, gibbons and other animals.

After our zoo visit, we had a little time to rest before heading to Jeff's friend Jay and Sheri's house for a barbecue.  Ruth and Henry played with Sheri's daughter and Ruth made a good friend that she already misses.  We hung out for awhile, but not everyone is on vacation, so we eventually headed home so they could go to bed.

This morning, we headed back to the Columbus Zoo to hit the waterpark, called Zoombeezi Bay.  It was pretty crowded even right at opening time, 10:30 a.m.  The kids and Jeff hit the wave pool and lazy river while I got a locker to store our valuables.  I met them as they were heading to water slides, and watched Ruth go down a hilly water slide.  It looks like the ones they have a carnivals that the kids sit on burlap mats to go down, but on this one, Ruth laid on her stomach on a foam mat.  She said it went really fast.



The Funnel



Henry and Jeff went on a monster slide.  It sailed through a tube that dumped them into a huge funnel, so that they shot up along one side of the funnel, then slid back to the other, until eventually they dropped out the hole in the bottom into a pool.  Jeff said he went backwards in the tube he shared with Henry, so he couldn't see where they were going, but he could see the look of terror on Henry's face.  Neither one of them wanted to do that one again.

There were many laps in the lazy river for all of us.  Unfortunately, due to an "accident" shortly after opening at the wave pool, they had to close it.  Seems someone couldn't make it to the restroom in time, if you get my drift.  Yuck.  The water park's policy is that they have to test chemicals for 10 hours after the accident, so the wave pool had to remain closed.  The impact was felt throughout the park.  The lazy river was packed; so much so that Jeff gave up on it because there was no room to stretch out without bumping into people.  The lines at all the slides were really long. 

After about four hours and a lunch break, we packed up our stuff and headed back into the zoo to check out a few things we missed yesterday.  Ruth and Henry both loved the animal show they have a few times a day, so they asked to see it again.  The show features pigs, a porcupine, kangaroo, ducks, geese, birds, cats and dogs who take turns running on the stage. 

Many Dippin' Dots and Icees were consumed by the group to stay cool, because the temperatures were between 86 and 92.

Exhausted, we headed back to the campground. 

The refrigerator is pretty empty, it being the end of the trip.  Since we were tired and hot, we balked at barbecuing our last night and went for Mexican food.  We ate at Senior Antonio's Mexicano Restaurant in Lewis Center.  The nachos with beef and cheese were delicious, as were our entrees.

Stomachs full and tired, we headed back to the campground again, after a quick stop at Walmart to pick up aloe vera for Henry's mild sunburn and drinks for the ride home tomorrow.