Lizard.
I forgot something from Saturday. We were getting ready to go on a buggy ride. Ty went to the bathroom and was really quiet. He came running out, went to where Jay and Lily were laying on the floor in the toy room and said, “hey guys! Look at this!!” And then I heard Jay say, “catch it! Catch it!” And I yelled, “get Lily off the ground! What is it?” Ty had quietly caught a tiny lizard from behind the trash can in Memaw’s bathroom. After showing Jay and Lily, he caught it again and carried it outside. And then we found his dropped tail in the bathroom… Gross!!! We had a follow up conversation about how lizards are OK to touch, but if that had been a spider or a snake he can’t touch it. God help me to bring my critter-loving son home safe…

Sunday morning.
Lily was up a couple times during the night (hence my blog post at 2:00 AM), but she made up for it by sleeping in our bed after a 5:00 snack until 7:00!!! I don’t remember the last time I got to stay in bed until 7:00. I came downstairs to breakfast sandwiches and fried potatoes nearly ready – delicious! And….Jay was able to fix the Seapen last night when the tide came up. On one hand I am glad I didn’t watch him fix it, on the other I wish he wouldn’t have stuck his arms in the bull shark water without someone there just in case. But, he was able to fix it, which is great news. Hopefully we don’t have more problems next time we go out. Good job Jay!! Ty was extra cuddly with Lily and wanted his picture taken with her a couple times. So sweet. Great start to the day.

Polish 10.
The plan for the day was to explore Tambourine Mountain with Memaw. On our way to get fuel, Memaw was asking about some of my previous trips overseas. I told her that our driver in Poland taught us how to count to 10 in Polish. Ty said, “I can count to 10 in Polish. Polish 1. Polish 2. Polish 3. Polish 4….Polish 10!” If only it were that easy…

Glow Worms.
First stop on the agenda was the Glow Worm cave. It is a man made cave that was built solely for the glow worms. It was a lot like looking at stars in the night sky. The worms use the light to attract insects, and then they capture them in their sticky traps. It was sort of interesting, sort of not. A bit too scientific, not as much entertainment, in my opinion. I probably wouldn’t send someone up the mountain just to see it, but now my curiosity had been satisfied.

Brewery.
We had a light lunch at the brewery in top of the mountain. Beautiful restaurant. Not great food or service. The ice cream and live music was a saving grace. Might give it one more chance…

Rainforest Skywalk.
I finally found something to redeem my on-the-fence opinion of Tambourine Mountain…the rainforest Skywalk. There is a nice trail and several walking bridges that go out above the super tall trees in the rainforest. It was beautiful. It has been a fairly dry summer, so there wasn’t much water, but I think it would be even cooler after a few good rains – creek beds were fairly dry, just a trickle of water. Ty and I got to play Tarzan on a vine that was hanging down over the path. It is harder that it looks!
This is one place I will recommend to visitors – definitely not something we can see in Iowa! As we were leaving, I took Ty to the restroom. On the way we passed a family eating a snack – gorgeous mama, handsome dad, adorable 3 year old daughter. Ty spotted a lizard on their table. I said, “whoa. Is that for real? There is a lizard on your table!” Then the guy picked it up and said it was their pet. Ty loved it – and he made me touch it. I think that was the highlight of his day. I chatted with them a bit. He had been to Vegas recently. She is Russian. I would have never thought by looking at them that they would have a pet reptile that they took on adventures with them, but I guess that is proof that looks can be deceiving.

Thunderpark.
Next stop was going to be a place called Thunderpark. Ty is really into rocks – loves picking them up and putting them in his pocket or backpack. This place has some rocks that you can hunt for and then crack open to find neat stuff inside (can you tell I am not a geologist). We got there about 3:00, only to find that they close the rock hunting area at 2:30. Thankfully the gift shop was open and Memaw bought Ty a rock to have cracked open. I was feeding Lily so I am going off of heresay, but they didn’t think it would have been worth the $65 entry fee to go find our own rocks. Um, yeah, pretty sure that is ridiculous for a few rocks…
Jay did point out that there is a caravan park attached to it (campground) and it had some pretty fabulous campsites. He compared it to a campground full of Uncle Eddy’s. Sorry I missed that.

Reality check.
Hold on. Did I just write about spending the day exploring a flipping rainforest?!?! With Memaw!! Blessed.