And then we discover you can only stop your mail for 30 days. Hmm. So we stop it for 30 days and ask my sweet sister to pick it up and then we will restop it for another 15 days. Ah, government!
Zoo Knoxville’s impressive reptile & amphibian exhibit
A king cobra comes out to greet us! Very impressive.
And then there is the king cobra, the longest venomous snake in the world. She slithers out of a hole in the wall to greet us. And she is a beauty.
What is cool about king cobras, both the parents will guard the nest until the eggs hatch. But the minute the baby snakes hatch, they are on their own.
It is always amazing to see the red wolves!
Dale’s casting was installed back in 2019. It is holding up well!
Greg is one of the world’s leading experts on painted dogs. After Greg’s talk, we got home Sat and the world locked down on Mon. Poor Greg didn’t get home to Zimbabwe for almost six months. His flight to South Africa was literally turned around upon landing and sent back to London as the country stopped accepting any new arriving flights, even for African citizens.
The wolves are really active since the rain cooled things off. We watch 5 brothers play & check us out. With only about 250 American red wolves in human care, each wolf is vitally important to help save the species from extinction. We are honored to spend time with them.
Red wolves don’t eat people!
A sign outside the red wolf habitat. But red wolves don’t eat people!
Edgar Evins State Park
Our first night camping spot
Ferns & spiders, oh my
We have never seen so many ferns on our hike.
Dale is up by 5:30 and we go on a fabulous hike through glades of ferns, paw paw trees and goldenrod. We are getting lots of ideas for our forest back home, especially the new 0.6 acres we just bought right next door to us.
And we find this cool orb-weaver spider with a triangle on its back. The triangle on their back resembles a flower that attracts pollinators allowing the spider to catch their dinner. Mother Nature at work.
There are a number of great hikes at Edgar Evins State Park and we end up going on 4 of them over a 2 day period. We opt to spend 2 nights at the park to rest up from all the prep work before our trip even started.
We see a cool an arrowhead orb weaver spider
A Magical Storybook Trail
A storyboard seen on a hike at Edgar Evins State Park
Our last hike before leaving the State Park is designed for children, called the Storybook Hike. We take Gibbs and he is not impressed but we are!
Ten storyboards were placed along a half mile hike through the woods. Each one describes an animal and its activity while counting from 1 to 10. It was fun and I am sure kids would love it. Plus, we have never seen anything like it before. Very imaginative for a state park.
Tomorrow we head toward Kansas City & Omaha. Whoo hoo!
Gibbs is not as impressed with hiking as we are!
