Category Archives: General Mutterings

Super Foods – Part 1



Yummy ways to eat yourself into better shape!

I didn’t invent these lists (there are 16 Super Foods in total), for that I must give credit to Rebecca Katz’s “The Longevity Kitchen” and my favorite source for advice to the aging – the AARP Magazine. But the comments are all mine!

Food 1: Coffee. Don’t need much to convince me that life without coffee isn’t worth living. But it’s nice to know that in addition to caffeine – there’s some good stuff – including antioxidants that can protect against cell damage and reduce your risk of chronic diseases like diabetes.

Food 2: Wild Salmon: It’s not just that it is a fish – and everyone knows that you should eat more fish – it’s also omega-3 fatty acid heavy (good not just for your heart, but also possibly a way to keep your DNA healthy).

Food 3: Sweet Potatoes: I admit – I just really prefer the taste of Sweet Potatoes over the plain boring white ones. But it’s seriously nice to consider that sweet potatoes have lots of Vitamin B6 and potassium. They can even help regulate blood pressure. And when eaten with the skin ON, they have more fiber than a copy of oatmeal.

Food 4: Olives/Olive Oil: Known to lower blood pressure and cholesterol, Olive Oil may even reduce the risk of stroke by up to 41%.

Need dinner tonight with 3 of the 4 super foods?
Try Salmon Burritos with Chile-Roasted Vegetables from MyRecipes.com. This recipe is rated as Outstanding!

The usual rice is replaced with pan-roasted sweet potatoes, onions, and poblano chiles, giving this burritos a healthy dose of fiber as well as heart-protecting micronutrients such as carotenoids (in the sweet potatoes), flavonoids (onions), folic acid (cabbage), and omega-3 fatty acids (salmon). Prep and Cook Time: about 45 minutes.

Nutritional Information – Amount per serving
Calories: 325
Calories from fat: 39%
Protein: 19g
Fat: 14g
Saturated fat: 2.5g
Carbohydrate: 30g
Fiber: 3.4g
Sodium: 852mg
Cholesterol: 45mg

Ingredients
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 teaspoons lime juice
4 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
1 1/2 teaspoons ground dried chiles
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 pound boned salmon fillet (about 1 in. thick) $
1 large Garnet or Jewel sweet potato, peeled, quartered lengthwise, then sliced 1/4 inch thick
1 zucchini, halved lengthwise, then sliced 1/3 inch thick
1 red onion, peeled, halved lengthwise, and cut into 1/4-inch-thick wedges
1 fresh poblano chile, stemmed, seeded, and chopped
6 whole-wheat flour tortillas (10 in. wide), warmed $
Chopped cilantro, shredded cabbage, low-fat sour cream, and lime wedges
Preparation

1. Preheat oven to 425°. Line two 12- by 15-inch baking pans with aluminum foil.
2. Whisk together the olive oil, lime juice, garlic, ground dried chiles, and salt.
3. Rinse salmon and pat dry. Brush flesh side of salmon with 2 tablespoons of the lime-chile marinade. Set aside.
4. In a medium bowl, toss the sweet potato, zucchini, onion, and chile with the remaining marinade. Arrange vegetables in a single layer on the baking pans.
5. Roast vegetables for 10 minutes, then add salmon, skin side down, to one pan and return to oven. Continue roasting until potatoes are tender when pierced and salmon is opaque but still moist-looking in center of thickest part, 7 to 10 minutes.
6. Remove skin from salmon and slice fillet into six equal portions.
7. Spoon vegetable mixture equally onto warm tortillas. Top each with a piece of salmon and a little cilantro, cabbage, and sour cream. Fold tortilla over the filling. Serve with more sour cream and the lime wedges.

Curious about the rest of the Super Foods? Stay tuned!

3 Hotels in 3 Days – Am I nuts or what?



Color me crazy – but I just slept in 3 different hotels in the last 3 nights. What would possess someone to do such a stupid thing? You can’t even take your clothes out of the suitcase – it almost isn’t worth even carrying the suitcase up to the room. Just grab the essentials and go.

Clearly – not my prefered way to travel. But my son got married in San Jose, CA on Thursday (GO Son GO!) and I had to get from Montreal to San Jose to Old Bedford, PA to Atlantic City to Montreal in 5 days. So 3 hotels it was going to be.

Hotel #1 – Ramada just off Highway 89 in Harrisburg, PA. We arrived at 12:30 – left at 8:00 – enjoyed the clean room, comfortable bed – awesome free breakfast (including make your own waffles and unlimited coffee and fruit), and free WI-FI. Perfect.

Hotel #2 – Hyatt Regency at the San Franciso Airport. Glorious hotel from the outside – it’s huge! There’s an inside atrium the size of a small football field, extending up 3 floors. 1/2 the rooms overlook the atrium – with mini balconys you can open to stop out into the ‘inside’. Quiet, very comfy bed, loved the oversized bathroom, great toilet featured low and high flush options, free water and fruit at check-in. Didn’t care for the $25 a day ‘valet’ service, and they charge for WI-FI. Breakfast also was extra. But I slept well. That has to count for something. Not quite as prefect as that Ramada though.

Hotel #3 – Marriott at Dulles Airport. Nothing much to look at from the outside, but at least the parking was free. It was extremely quiet – so clearly they have great windows since we are literally feet from the landing strips. Bed was comfy – since we arrived at 8:00 am and checked out at noon (after a red-eye flight from San Francisco) – quiet and comfy was just right. But the bathroom was tiny, the toilet didn’t flush quite right, the WI-FI is free only in the bar, and there wasn’t even a bowl of fruit to welcome us. Lousy shower too.

So bottom line – Ramada tops the list – but there weren’t any clear loosers. I do think that Marriott ought to be a tad embarassed though.

8 Easy Steps to Eating Smart when Eating out!



This is one of my all time favorite topics. I leave and breathe eating out – and I watch my weight like a hawk. I went with Weight Watchers in Feb 2002 – lost 30 pounds by June 2002 – and have kept it off for over 11 years now. Clearly – I’m pretty pound of that accomplishment. I weigh what I weighed in High School. Rocking Grannie!

BUT – there’s a price to pay in staying slim and eating out more nights than I eat in – and I call it the menu game. And like all games, there are rules.

Step 1: Before sitting down – Choose your price point and be sure that the restaurant offers options that will work. For example – if you are thinking of spending about $20 per person – the average price for the entries on the menu should be $10 to $15. The wine, the dessert, the tip and taxes will bounce a $10 entry up to $20 in a blink of the eye.

Step 2: Choose your cuisine – A study by the folks at Tufts School of Nutrition has determined that there are ‘better’ cuisines and ‘worse’ cuisines from an average calorie point of view. Not surprisingly, Vietnamese and Japanese have the lowest average calories when their most popular dishes were analyzed, while Italian, American and Chinese have the highest average calorie counts. (Check out the exact numbers in the study published in JAMA Internal Medicine by Susan Roberts, Director of the HNRCA Energy Metabolism Laboratory. Susan Roberts also is the author of “The “i” Diet” (www.myidiet.com))

Step 3: Try not to arrive famished. This is so hard to avoid, and so critical to keeping control over how much you eat. The other day I ended up devouring almost 1/2 of a delicious milk shake because I was just too hungry when I walked in to remember to ask for water.

Step 4: Always ask for water first – and always drink it before ordering. Then you can focus on what you are ordering, and not ‘shop hungry’.

Step 5: Plan ahead – and either order a small portion – or try to put 1/2 away before you start eating. Restaurants, particularly smaller ones at lower price points, serve way too much food. In fact, those crazy folks at the Tufts Nutrition School cited above studied calorie counts and determined that average meals in 33 randomly selected smaller restaurants in the Boston area ended up weighing in at an astounding 1,327 calories per meal – that’s about twice a normal meal, and more calories than I normal consume in a day. More distressing – fully 73% of the meals they analyzed in their study contained more than 1/2 the daily recommended calories per day for an adult. No wonder we get fat eating out. So plan on take out – every time you eat out. In fact 12 of the 157 meals analyzed actually contained more than 2000 calories – the calories recommended for an entire day

Step 5: Be a fussy eater! Ask for all sauces and all salad dressings to be served ‘on the side’. That way you can control how much of the most fattening things get in your stomach!

Step 6: Don’t order what you really shouldn’t eat. If you don’t order the french fries – you won’t be tempted. Don’t ruin fish (something you should try to eat at least twice a week) by getting it fried, and if you order steak – order the small portion.

Step 7: Put your fork down between bites. This works for any meal – home cooked, or eaten out. Study after study has shown that it takes time for your tummy to register ‘full’, and it’s easy to eat so fast that you go past that point. In fact – this is why I love tasting menus. The time delay between the courses gives my body time to decide how hungry I still am.

Step 8: Carry food with you – and eat it when you get hungry! I always have a small resealable container of almonds with me. They are the perfect snack – not terribly high in calories, take effort to eat (if it goes down fast – it didn’t count is false!)

Well there you have it – 8 easy steps to eating Smart when eating Out.

Best Car Rental Experience Ever!


I travel a lot. I know that. So I’m frequently renting cars. And my go to rental place is hotwire.com. I type in the location I’m interested in renting the car, and I take the least expensive car available and I’m done.

So that’s why I was heading to National/Alamo in Detroit on Friday around noon. Hotwire had randomly assigned them to me. And all I’d planned to do was to pick up a compact and head up to Bloomfield Hills.

The trip from the airport to the car rental place was pretty average – not short, not long. Just long enough to grab a map from the rack and try to figure out where we’d be heading in just a bit.

We get off the bus – and get greeted with a friendly smiling employee – and asked if we’d like to try to automated kiosk – or go traditional. I opt for traditional and join the short waiting line. That’s when I notice the bags of freshly popped popcorn. Yum. And free water bottles! Little mini ones – but hey – they were in a fridge and nice and cold. My kind of quick pick-me-up after a boring flight. In case we didn’t notice – an employee would occasionally walk by offering water and popcorn to everyone. Nice.

We check in as normal – no, we don’t want an upgrade, no, we don’t want the gas, no we don’t want insurance. We get our forms – and are told to take any car sitting in the compact lane. That’s cool. I prefer darker colored cars – so this way I get to choose.

Walking out – there’s another employee – grilling hotdogs. Looks yummy – but right now we’re focused on getting our car. We walk to the compact lane – no cars! We spot another employee and ask – what do we do. Her reply – you get a free up grade. Take any car you want!

Really? No joke? That’s so cool.

So – hey – I press my luck. You got a hybrid around? We’ve been thinking of getting one, and I’m worried about the silent engine. She looks around, says that there is not one in the lanes – but she thinks there might be one getting a car wash. She’ll check – but meanwhile, we should wait by the grill – maybe grab a hot dog.

We do, she does – and we drive away in a Hybrid Sonata! It’s very cool. No leather seats, but nice pick-up on the highway, completely silent when you turn it on – and of course, hard to be sure you’ve turned it off. The first few times – it kept beeping at us because we’d press the button once too often. But we eventually caught on. And at the end of the weekend of driving all around Bloomfield Hills – I’m guessing about 200 miles in total – our ‘fill-up’ cost us under $10.

Hybrids are cool. The Sonata is a very nice car. And the Alamo in Detroit is a great Car Rental Agency. One note – Hotdogs are only served on Thursday and Fridays! Popcorn and water are always available.

Oh the people you’ll meet – Riding the train from Montreal to Toronto


There are 4 different ways to get from Montreal to Toronto. You can drive – it’s about 6 hours, and very boring. You can ride the bus – which is about 8 hours, and while you don’t have to drive the thing, it’s not exactly luxurious. You can fly – either to the Island Airport (which I keep promising myself to do, and have never actually done), or to Toronto International which is an airport I avoid under all circumstances.

Or – you can take the train. The train takes 4 hours. You arrive minutes before it is due in Dorval, stand either on the platform or in the train station, climb on – and off you go. From Montreal to Toronto, seats are assigned – so you know which car, you know which seat – it’s quite easy. Most of the time.

And generally fairly reasonable. In the height of the season, a senior ticket is around $100 one way, including all taxes. So it’s less pricy than flying, and about the same amount of time if one includes arriving at least 2 hours ahead for the plane!

So – Friday am, 7:11 finds me on the train heading to Toronto. I’d selected a window seat months ago, but it was taken by a lovely older woman, who explained that she’d given up her seat to a woman with a baby. The baby in question was ensconced in one of those giant carrying seats – and the woman was apparently asleep. Oh well – guess I’m getting an aisle seat this time. I don’t mind the aisle, it’s really just that I prefer the window. But it’s hard not to feel a bit sorry for the baby at least.

I make myself comfy – I brought along fruit to munch, figuring that no matter what they had to sell it wouldn’t be either on my diet or frankly – fresh and yummy. Packaged cakes are easier for the staff – but hardly made this morning.

Naturally, being of similar ages, my seat mate and I start to chat – and chat – and chat. She has 2 sons, and 3 grandkids. She’s going to visit a friend in Toronto that she’s known since elementary school. She recently took a river boat cruise from Prague which was great except that her roommate – an extremely good friend that she’s spent much time with – turns out to be a better house mate than room-mate. In fact, she’s a lousy room-mate – insisting on lights out at 10:30 – and no noise. Hard to take a shower before bed, hard to party if you must undress in the dark. But overall the river boat was apparently a wonderful trip – worth thinking about.

My new friend continues to tell me about her life. Her husband died very young, and very suddenly. He had just been playing golf, came in – complained of not feeling well, and died. She called a neighbor who called 911 – and tried to do mouth to mouth to no avail. That was quite some time ago – since then she’s had a male companion – who she will not marry, nor live with – but loves to travel with. Interesting. I think about how truly boring my life must appear to most people – my husband and I are celebrating 43 years of marriage this September.

We discuss the challenges involved in finding someone to travel with – I remind myself how fortunate I am that I have 2 travel companions – my husband for upscale trips or downscale re-enactments, and the Intrepid Traveller for long stays in one country. Somethings just work out like that. I wonder if she thinks I’m fortunate – or merely boring. The old adage – walk a mile in someone elses shoes – seems so valid at moments like this.

We chat for effectively the entire trip, interrupted only by trying to figure out the capital of Finland (It’s Helsinki), and by the young man with the food cart. Such lousy coffee – at least it’s not insanely expensive too.

At our arrival in Toronto we part ways – her to find a porter and her friend. Me to drag myself and my tiny traveling bag to the Royal York to meet up with my husband.

Ships that collide in the night – and likely never meet again.

Great trip. Thanks Seatmate!

The Female Perspective – Buying a Car S*CKs!


I admit it – I hate having to buy a new car. We lease our car 3 years at a time – so every 3 years we go through this absolute horrific (to me) and delightful (to my husband) routine of picking our next car.

I wish I lived on another planet.

The ritual starts with a visit to the annual car show. My husband argues that this allows him to see all the newest cars in one place. But in my experience, the cars he’s interested in are rarely displayed – and if displayed, rarely open. So he takes his list, goes from dealership to dealership, asking if the MTX5GL is available to see. After waiting in line to find someone who has not just been hired to look good at the show, but might actually have some car knowledge, the answer seems to be – No – we have the MLX4GQ here – but if you want to see the MTX5GL – it’s a) not available in this country, or b) only available at the showroom, or c) only due to arrive in Montreal in 5 weeks.

Sigh

For this I have to pay for tickets, suffer the crowds, and push pass stroller after stroller full of kids.

Best part of the car show – the free pens and the shopping bags. And I loved the simulators. But for seeing cars – it’s so close to a waste, it’s hard to defend.

Back at home, my husband pours over the colorful – but information empty – brochures. No one is going to say – this car is a road hog, or we are lying about the gas mileage. Nope – it’s pretty pictures of a smiling family on the road driving past glorious scenery. So little truth in advertising that they Photoshop out the windshield wipers. They ruin the sleekness of the cars. (Don’t believe me – check it out!)

Eventually – we pick 3 or 4 or 5 different brands that might offer a car that sounds like it might offer the right combination of price, drive-ability, comfort, and size for our needs. And then begins the test drive phase. For reasons known only to Quebec, car dealerships can not be open on Saturday or Sunday. So no test drives on the weekends. You have to either go after work, or during work. For those of us with real jobs that require real effort – neither option is going to result in a stress-free experience.

And getting an appointment is a joke. We had a 6:00 pm appointment at one dealership in particular (I’m not naming names – but you know who you are) and arrived on time to wait an HOUR for someone to recognize that we weren’t there is admire the cars on display. It’s really hard to get energized after cooling your heals that long. I’ve gotten more attention in the emergency room of a hospital!

Ok – test drive phase over, it’s now time to actually pick the car. We like specific colors, and certain options. The sales team want to sell the cars on the lot. So they work hard to convince us that blue isn’t that great – glossy pink is the hot color this year! Eventually we manage to make them understand that we don’t really want pink. Really not. So there’s a draft contract – and then the fun really starts.

The salesman is just that – a salesman. His job – get a draft contract for something – anything – in our hands. Then he has to call his ‘boss’ – who tries to make us think that our salesman has overstepped his bounds by offering us that price, that color, that combination of features. Something, anything to a) increase the price or b) get us to immediately hand over money. We’ve walked out countless times at this point – only to be called back and told – ok – you can have the car you want at the price our salesman quoted you.

What a joke.

Anyway – we’re now at the final phase – car delivery. And since that is yet to happen – let’s all imagine that it will go swimmingly. Should work. Right?

6 Basic Rules for picking the Perfect Vacation Rental!


How do you pick a B&B or a hostel? With places like VRBO, HostelWorld, Booking.com and AirBnB competing for your Reservation dollars – finding the best place to spend your holiday bucks is getting more and more complicated.

My solution – 6 basic rules!

These rules may seem simple, obvious even – but I’ve traveled around the world on them – in places were I don’t speak the language, don’t have a tour guide, don’t know a soul. And have had great success in picking places to stay that worked out perfectly – my one oops – I forgot my rule #2. Serves me right I think. So read and remember.

Rule #1 – Location. No matter how good the B&B is – if it isn’t where you want to be, it’s useless. I loved the Agit in Seoul, South Korea – but if you need to stay in Prescott, Ontario – the Agit is not going to do it.

Rule #2 – Reviews matter. Seriously. It is really important to check the reviews – you’ll get some bad ones – it happens, but if there are lots of reviews, and they are mostly positive, it’s a good sign. Actually – it’s a great sign. I’ve never been disappointed in a place with great reviews – nope, it’s the ones with NO reviews that tend to scare me away.

Rule #3 – Know what is important to you. If the review says – great place to party – and you don’t party – stay away. It will be noisy – and you’ll be disappointed. On the other hand – if you are looking to met people, a place that is quiet and calm is probably not going to work out.

Rule #4 – Check prices. B&Bs, hostels, and hotels will list on lots of different web sites – booking.com, expedia.com, tripadvisor.com, hostelworld.com – the list goes on and on. So if you find one that seems right – take a minute to check other sites. The websites would rather you didn’t do that – and they try to rush you (5 people looking at this B&B right now) – but take your time. I’ve avoided some really bad decisions by just being a little slow.

Rule #5 – Know your price range. I travel ‘cheap’, I travel ‘upscale’ – and it’s really critical to remember what you can and cannot afford. I’ve never been happy with a choice when I forget to be sure it’s a price I’m comfortable paying. Forget this – and you too will be sorry!

Rule #6 – Correspond directly with your host. Ask a simple question (Do they have cats, is the bed King-sized, how do I get to you from the airport) – getting an answer will tell you two very important things – a) They can figure out how to communicate in English – even if it means getting help from their grand-kids, and b) They are real. Never underestimate the importance of real. When you get where you are going – you are going to want to figure out where to eat, how to get from here to there, how to get fresh towels. If there’s a host – and they respond by email, odds are they will respond to you face to face even better.

So them’s the rules – simple right?. But they work for me – and I’ll bet they will work for you!

It’s my 65th Birthday!


Send a card! PLEASE… I adore cards… I got 64 for my 64th birthday – let’s beat the record this year! (And late cards are completely acceptable..)

Thanks for following me – I totally love comments – I love feedback, and did I say something about cards?

PS: People who already sent cards – and you know who you are – Thanks!

Hugs

Leslie
aka: TheSoupLady
aka: Montreal Madame….

Why, oh why is travel so challenging?


I must be a sadist at heart – or else why would I book another trip just a week after flying back from Korea? I mean – isn’t 25 hours of travel enough? It took me 3 days to recover from jet lag. Who needs more of this stuff? Well – apparently – I do.

Months ago my 2 sisters and I had agreed that it had been way too long since we’d had a decent conversation with each other. get-together with kids and husbands around were fun – but opportunities to actually talk – non-existent. So despite the conjunction with my trip back from Korea – we’d planned an “I’m not yet 65” birthday sisters weekend – in Lake Lure, N.C. This meant I’d fly to Columbia, S.C. on Wednesday, see my sister’s newly redesigned kitchen, then we’d drive the 2 hours to Lake Lure. Sounds great.

Bonus – when I go to check in on-line – I’m offered a $49 upgrade to business class! Winner. Amazing. Sure – I’ll take it.

So it’s Wednesday night – and here I am – at the Montreal airport – booked on a United flight thru Washington, D.C. I eat a lousy dinner at the airport – something billed as meat lasagna – but tasting more like cheap tomato sauce with meat waved in its directions and I join the suspiciously large crowd around gate C82.

Hmm – the sign doesn’t say Washington, D.C. yet – is says Cleveland.

But like most well laid plans, the weather angels decided it was a no go. Cancelled flights here, there and everywhere – just because of some rain and severe thunderstorms lasting 6 hours in a 250 mile swatch running across most of the midwest. Honestly. Is plane travel so retarded that they can’t land in a little rain? Maybe it was the cross winds. Whatever – no plane, no go. So sorry.

Options – I fly to Dulles, spend the night on my own dime (if I can find a hotel room – with canceled flights all over – likelihood not good), and fly on in the morning from there. Or – I go home, spend the night in my own bed – and just start over again on Thursday.

I opt for my own bed. Bad news – the guy who rebooked me doesn’t do it right – I lose my paid for status as ‘business class’ –

So now it’s Thursday. And with better weather, planes are at least taking off on time. I’ll manage to get where I want to go some time today.

Being a optomist at heart – I’m willing to forgive United the boo-boo – particularly because when I get to Chicago (mid-point of flight – nothing from Montreal goes direct to anywhere I want to go) – I discover what really bad looks like.

Chicago is a mess. No seriously – a mess. On Wednesday flights got canceled and delayed – and when they re-route, reschedule you because of weather – they have a lovely little pre-printed brochure that effectively says no food, no lodging, no refunds! I ran into a wonderful family of 4 that had finished a fab holiday in Spain, including a cruise, and were just trying to get home. They’d arrived in Chicago at 7:30 pm on Wednesday – I ran into them at around 10:00 am on Thursday – and it didn’t look good. They’d been re-booked onto a flight that got canceled early this morning – been standby (and clearly not made it) on two more flights – and were now officially giving up. They got an absolute booking for a flight on Friday – and were on their way to a hotel to sleep.

There are literally people everywhere – some just sitting and looking sad – some actually asleep. The stand-by lists to just about everywhere are filled – and I’m guessing that they can’t just bring in a larger plane – or 2 – or 3.

This is truly sad. On the positive side, a gentleman just got up to give his seat in this overcrowded waiting area to an older couple. Nice.

And just to make sure I’m awake – another guy just announced that there are severe thunderstorms forecast in my destination city.

If nothing goes wrong – it’s not much of an Adventure, is it?

Signing off – and hoping the plane flies…. The Soup Lady

Children’s Grand Park in Seoul – Go with the kids for a splashing good time!


Sometimes the best things are Free!

On Monday – the museums are closed in Seoul. So we ended up going to the Children’s Grand Park. This is reputed to be the largest of its kind – at least in Korea, and I must admit that it was huge.

As I’ve mentioned previously – Korean’s know how to do big public spaces – and this is another wonderful example. They thrown in a bit of everything – and most of it is free. The highlight of our visit, for the younger crowd (age 5 in our case), was the adorable water playground.

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It had fountains, it had mini-waterfalls, it had rocks, and bridges, and lots and lots of kids. Including an adorable pair of toddlers who proved why man invented ‘swmmies’ – diapers designed for swimming. They weren’t wearing them – and quickly were clothed in incredible soggy messes! Off with the diapers!

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There was also a Zoo – a tad tired around the edges, but it did have tigers, and leopards, and a Puma. I’d never seen a Puma before. The best exhibits were hidden away in separate buildings – I loved the bonsai tree garden, and found the kiddie zoo section quite cute.

One Koreanism that struck me as very funny was the Polar Bear exhibit. Yes they had a Polar Bear – for whom I felt very sad. But they had also created a photo moment of an Inuit with an Igloo. I couldn’t resist taking a picture – and got 2 willing Korean volunteers to pose for me. Based on this zoo’s image of Canada – Inuit are small – and vaguely resemble Santa Claus. Doesn’t it make you wonder what we have wrong in our Zoo’s?

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There is a sculpture garden made out of bits and pieces of everything (including ET) – quite fun to examine. And there are bridges to cross, animal shows that charge $, and 2 amusement parts – one for little kids, and one for bigger kids (More $), and the predictable junk to buy.

But really – it’s about the water playground if you are with kids – and that is well worth seeing.

Signing off – completely exhausted – the Soup Lady and the Intrepid Traveler.