A great place to take the kids when on vacation around Gulf Shores is the Alabama Gulf Coast Zoo. This zoo distinguishes itself from others by offering various animal encounters. You can actually play with baby tigers, though at $50 per person it is a little more than most would likely spend.

Tiger Encounter

The zoo itself is fairly inexpensive, $11 for adults and $8 for kids 3-12. And while it isn’t as large as other zoos I’ve been through, there is enough to easily spend a few hours exploring. There are plenty of big cats, bears, and lots of little critters too.

Baby Macaws

You can definitely get a little closer to many of the animals here at this zoo. We saw some animal shows taking place at various times, and keepers out talking with visitors often.

Caged Family

The lemur encounter was only $10 per person, plus it was free for our two-year-old daughter. My mom was happy to take her inside the cage to pet these primates and get some pictures. There enjoyed playing the lemurs for a good fifteen minutes before moving on to the next exhibit.

Lemur Encounters

The zoo has been open since 1989 and is open year round and has survived many hurricanes, several of which have forced evacuations for most of the animals. During Hurricane Ivan a twelve-foot alligator was lost for a week before being found and relocated back to his caged in pond.

12 Foot Gator

I’m told they are trying to build a new location farther inland and less likely to flood. This facility was announced in 2009 and was supposed to open in 2013 but it has yet to do so. They are now targeting the summer of 2017.

A week and a half after returning home from Virginia Beach, my family and I packed our bags again and headed out for Gulf Shores, Alabama. For this trip we would be joined by a couple dozen family members from my mom’s side. We all stayed in a twelve bedroom house on Orange Beach, part of the Cottages of Romar development.

Sapphire Pool

We had a wonderful community pool with zero depth entry, our own private pool attached to the house, and private beach access to the wonderful white sands of the gulf. There isn’t much within walking distance, but we were able to take a couple of bike rides to see some sites and grab something to eat. With such a large house and so many activities going on, it was most fun hanging out with family and enjoying the relaxing vacation.

Busch Family

Late May through June was filled with a series of vacations. Not only did my family and I take a road trip through southern Ontario, we also had two trips to the beach. The first of these beach trips was with my in-laws to Virginia Beach, which we last visited in 2011.

28th Street Guard

This was a bit of a whirlwind trip, leaving on Saturday evening and driving through the night then coming back on Wednesday evening with another drive through the night, but that was as many days as we could fit into everyone’s schedules last-minute.

Sandstock

Even with the shorter trip we still managed to squeeze in a beach concert, a couple of rounds of mini golf, a few restaurant experiences, a brewery stop, and of course plenty of time swimming in the ocean and the hotel pool. It’s nice that there was so much to do and see all within walking/biking distance of our hotel.

Beach Family

The one thing that really distinguishes Virginia Beach from other beaches is the 28 feet wide paved boardwalk that stretches three miles along the beach. The boardwalk sits between the sand and any buildings and features a separate bike path. This makes getting up and down the beach a breeze and there is always some sort of entertainment taking place on the boardwalk. The downside is that you always have to cross the boardwalk to get to the beach from your hotel, even if you have an oceanfront view.

The last stop on our recent trip up to Toronto and back was near Cleveland to check out Cuyahoga Valley National Park. To do so we took a train ride aboard the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad. Originally I had hoped to rent bikes to ride through park of the park and use the train to get back to where we started, but it was too rainy during our visit to do so.

All Aboard

We got on the train in Independence, OH at the Rockside Station. From there we enjoyed a 40 minute trip do to Peninsula. Here we did a little Canalway Questing to explore the Towpath Trail and a couple of the old locks that were part of the Ohio & Erie Canal.

Lock 29 Bridge

Back on the train we enjoyed another trip back north to where we started. We were able to see some of the park’s wildlife and even spotted a bald eagle. My youngest swears that she saw a bear, but she was the only one on the entire train. We had a nice time exploring the park through the train, but I really wish we could have biked some of the trail too.

Please Remain Seated

After spending time exploring the Bruce Peninsula area and Toronto, my family and I made a stop for one night to see Niagara Falls. This was the first time my wife and I had been to the falls since 2007, and this time we would be on the opposite side of the falls.

Grand View

Kim & Trey

Family Shot

We parked in Clifton Hill and after managing to avoid most of the tourist traps of the area made our way to the Grand Viewing area of Niagara Parks. It is really great how you can see nearly all the falls from one spot on the Canadian side.

American Falls

Horseshoe Falls

We walked along the wide sidewalk along towards the Table Rock Welcome Centre but didn’t make it all the way there. The kids were ready to move on to the Great Wolf Lodge where we would enjoy plenty of kids activities for the rest of the day.

Before leaving the Bruce Peninsula area, we checked out of our yurt and then made one final stop in Tobermory to explore the Fathom Five National Marine Park. We took a glass bottom boat tour through Bruce Anchor Cruises on the Tobermory Frontier to Flowerpot Island.

This cruise first took us past a couple of the 22 total shipwrecks that are within the park border. From there we headed out to our destination of Flowerpot Island where we paid $9 extra to get off and explore, which was well worth the added cost. It wasn’t a far hike out to the namesake flowerpot rock formations where we were able to sit and have a picnic lunch. We also took some time to explore one of the many caves on the island, before it was time to head back to the dock and catch our ride back to Tobermory.

We also stopped at the Visitor Centre on our way out-of-town. Unfortunately it was closed during our visit, but we were still able to climb the steps of the lookout tower for an overview of the entire Georgian Bay area.

With a few days to spare before we had to be in Toronto, my family and I decided to spend a couple of nights camping in Bruce Peninsula National Park. This would not be your average camping trip, instead we stepped it up and notch and tried out glamping. Bruce Peninsula has ten yurts that available for rent inside the park near Cyprus Lake. While we still didn’t have running water inside the yurt (running water was available at the bathhouse), I still think I may have ruined my wife from ever sleeping in a tent again.

We had a pretty good amount of rain the first day in the park, but we still managed to hike out to the Grotto and Indian Head Cove along the Georgian Bay Trail and parts of the Bruce Trail. The cliffs and caves of the rugged Georgian Bay coast were impressive, as was the crystal clear water. The rain cleared by evening and we had a beautiful sunset to enjoy while surrounding the fire pit and roasting marshmallows. It was nice to nearly completely disconnected from the outside world for a couple of days.

We made a few stops on our way up to Toronto a few weeks back. The first was a visit to the African Lion Safari outside of Hamilton, Ontario and just an hour or so outside of central Toronto. Last year my family and I went through northern Ohio’s African Safari Wildlife Park, and this one is similar to that but even wilder. In addition to the deer, bison, bongo, zebra, and giraffes, the African Lion Safari’s drive through game reserves also feature African lions, cheetahs, and baboons! There is nothing between your car and any of these animals.

Feeding of the animals is not allowed, though one of the cars in front of us was feeding the baboon bananas causing the group to climb all over our cars. This was definitely the highlight of the drive through safari. Though it was also really cool to see the African lions up close and without a cage blocking the view.

After exploring the game reserves we spent even more time taking in the elephant round-up show, looking at the bird aviaries, petting the goats in the petting zoo, and playing in both the jungle playground and Misumu Bay wet play area. The elephant show featured Asian elephants showing their strength, playing sports, and even making a painting that would later be for sale. As much fun as my kids had seeing the animals, they had as much fun in the play areas, even the wet play when the temperature couldn’t have been more than 65 degrees.

We came for the drive through safari but enjoyed the other aspects of the park just as much. In the end we stayed for hours longer than I initially thought we would. With so much to do it is easy to spend the entire day there.

Last week my family and I drove nearly 1,500 miles up to, through southern Ontario, Canada, and back. My wife needed to be in Toronto for some work functions for one of the days. Rather than drive up and back over the course of a few days, we decided to make a week of it and check out some of the surrounding areas. I still have to go through the photos on my DSLR of these areas, so for now here are some photos from my phone of our days in Toronto.

Lego!

Lego Hockey

Our first destination in Toronto was the LEGOLAND Discovery Centre. Lately Trey has become very interested in Lego, and he loved this just as much as I thought he would. There was also enough to keep Paige, our two-year-old, very busy for a couple of hours. The rides were fun, and we all enjoyed the 4D movie, but their favorite exhibits were hands on building with Lego blocks. I think any kids over the age of ten might start to get a little bored, as most exhibits seem geared towards the young.

CN Tower

Tower View

Later that same day we walked around the downtown area. Since the weather was pretty good we decided to take a trip to the top of the CN Tower. It is a little pricey, but the view from the top is amazing, plus the glass floor is always a treat. While the weather on the ground appeared nice, the wind was really strong at the top. The lower level of the viewing areas are outside, so it was quite thrilling to walk all the way around and feel just how strong the wind could be.

Glass Floor

Rainbow over Toronto

We were treated to a beautiful rainbow on our walk back to our hotel, a great way to end our first day in Toronto. On the second day my wife had to go into the office, as I mentioned earlier. Trey, our four-year-old, woke up and wanted to see Ripley’s Aquarium of Canada, so off we went. I feel like once you’ve seen one aquarium, you’ve seen nearly all of them, but this was a good one to visit.

Ripleys Aquarium of Canada Jellyfish

Nap Time

After a nap, the kids and I decided to explore a little more before mom would be done with work. So we took one of the streetcars over to the Corktown Common Park. Once we got off the streetcar, Trey immediately picked up the scent of donuts, so we followed our noses to Tim Hortons, before continuing on to the playground.

Tim Hortons

Corktown Common Park

I had only visited Toronto one time before, back when I was in junior high. This time I visited some of the same sights I did as a child, and some others that didn’t exist back then. There were even some things I did back then that we didn’t do this time around, but hopefully we can make a return visit to see more. Toronto offers so many things to do, especially for visitors, that you could easily spend a week there and not get bored.

Recently there was an article posted by WCPO’s Jesse Folk asking the question, “Are there too many breweries in Cincinnati?” Most seem to be believe that we are far from the saturation point and I couldn’t agree more.

Jagged Mountain Brewery

I spent the majority of last week on business in Denver. When I moved away from Denver in 2011 there were definitely less breweries in town than there are in Cincinnati now. And now there are over 100 breweries in the greater Denver metro area.

On my first night in town I explored a couple of these breweries in the newly revitalized River North Art District. There are currently ten breweries in this one neighborhood, none of which existed five years ago.

River North Brewery

In fact there are so many breweries in the area now that even my friends living in Denver have become a little overwhelmed. There is definitely a long way for Cincinnati to go before I could become overwhelmed by the choices available.