Brown Bear Brown Bear What Do You See?

Side trip to Williams – 11 miles

Today was all about being lazy and getting ready to head to Vegas in the morning.  Al needed to hang around the RV to wait for the repairman so Blake and I headed into Williams for the morning. 

First stop – Bearizona.  Bearizona is a 3-mile drive through Wildlife Park and a walk around park for the smaller animals.  In our drive through the park we saw all kinds of wildlife – we saw mountain goats, bison, burros, wolves, and bear. 

There were strict rules about keeping windows rolled up and doors locked when driving through the wolf and bear habitats.  We were told to keep moving if a bear approaches the car.  This is because the bear like to climb on top of cars and sometimes remove the side mirrors.  The staff member told us they would get us back the mirror if it was removed but they couldn’t guarantee the return state!

When driving through the wolf habitat, we came up right next to an arctic wolf sleeping on the side of the road.  He lifted his head briefly, looked at us and laid back down for his siesta.  Another wolf was walking down a road adjacent to us.  The junior bears were quite active – walking around and crossing the road in front of us. 

The American Bison were out in a big field we circled through.  There were several out there ranging in size from very little to very large.  The largest had big eyes staring back at us. 

Blake and I laughed about all the Bison we saw when visiting Yellowstone several years ago.  The bison pretty much rule the roost there and walk wherever they please.  It doesn’t matter if it is straight down the middle of the road!

We witnessed this Bison walking down the middle of the road when on a trip in Yellowstone in 2012.

When we pulled into the mountain goat habitat Blake quickly noticed the male sitting high on the top of the hill and mentioned that he looked a lot like Ramses, the UNC Tarheel mascot.  I noticed the little babies running around the bottom of the hill.

Our final habitat was that of the brown bears.  I couldn’t help but think of the book I used to read to the kids when they were little, Brown Bear Brown Bear.  I found myself saying, “Brown bear brown bear, what do you see?  I see some humans looking at me.”  Many of the bears were sleeping in the woods under the trees but several were actively moving around, scratching themselves, and digging in the dirt. 

After leaving the drive through park, we parked our car and headed towards the walk around park of smaller animals.  We learned that all the animals at Bearizona are rescue animals.  One of these rescue animals was a turkey that we met in the Barnyard.  This turkey was all blown up and puffed out and his name was Joe.  We learned from the staff that a family who recently acquired him from their grandmother gave Joe to Bearizona.  Joe was one of several turkeys the grandmother had on her farm, but Joe was the only one to avoid being eaten at Thanksgiving.  Joe is a people pleaser and has quite a personality.  He likes attention so he gets all puffed up, spreads his wings, and struts his stuff.  He follows people who are paying attention to him and loves to get his picture taken.

Before leaving the walk around park, Blake wanted to go see the Jaguar.  Blake kept saying the Jaguar looked like a panther.  We stood and watched the jaguar for quite some time.  We heard him growl and we watched him play with a large blue ball floating in the water in his habitat.  It was funny to watch him reach for the ball in the water and try to get it.  When the ball rolled out farther into the water he would cross around to the other side and try to get it again.  This went on for several minutes.  Finally he was successful.  He had the ball between his paws. He played with it for a bit and then it popped back out and into the water.  Blake and I laughed.

On our way out of the park we couldn’t resist a cone of homemade ice cream.  It was a perfect way to end our morning at Bearizona!

After our time in Bearizona we headed into Williams to scope out the possibility of returning for Mexican food that evening.  Unfortunately the restaurant was closed.  Before returning to the RV we headed to Safeway to pick up some necessities – food and water.

Our afternoon was spent at the KOA.  We did some laundry, played a few games of Galaga, Ms. Pac Man, pool, as well as a serious round of mini golf.  Al took first place in golf with a score of +1, I came in second with +3, and Blake was last with +7.

The rest of the day was spent planning the last part of our trip.  We made reservations and secured plans to travel back to Arkansas to float the Buffalo River with my brother Mike, return to St. Louis to visit friends, go to a baseball game, and attend the Jimmy Buffet concert, and travel to Nashville where we will see the USA vs Panama soccer game. 

Al and I got in an early evening TRX workout, ate dinner, packed up, and headed to bed early. My alarm is set for 3:15 AM because we are heading to Vegas in the morning for a 9:00 AM appointment to get our air conditioning repaired.