It was very cool. Essentially, its a tilapia farm, where they grow the fish (and over 400 alligators) in natural geothermal pools. The tilapia also act as food for the gators, and the waste water is filtered through an amazing collection of tropical plants and irrigates the plants that they grow to feed the herbivorous reptiles in residence. It’s incredibly eco-friendly, and from what we could tell, basically a closed system. They’re also right across the street from an 80-acre solar farm, which is really kind of creepy in a way.

Anyway…….GATORS!

RAWR!

A sad thing about the alligators here is that almost 1/3 of them were, at some point, pets that people could no longer care for. Fortunately, they found a home at Gator Farm, where they are well taken care of.

Don't fall in!

They also have some scary ostriches, and one lonely wallaby…..

Mean, scary ostrich

Zen Wallaby

There are several greenhouses that house fish, plants, and smaller gators and reptiles:

Pools of tilapia

Well, that about sums it up. All in all it was an awesome weekend

]]> http://chrisandamy.wordpress.com/2009/10/25/gator-farm/feed/ 0 chrisandamy 20091025_0061 20091025_0065 20091025_0062 20091025_0063 20091025_0054 http://chrisandamy.wordpress.com/2009/10/25/great-sand-dunes-national-park/ http://chrisandamy.wordpress.com/2009/10/25/great-sand-dunes-national-park/#comments Mon, 26 Oct 2009 02:48:11 +0000 chrisandamy http://chrisandamy.wordpress.com/?p=145 ]]> This weekend we went hiking in the Great Sand Dunes National Park! We took a 6 or 7 mile loop around to the summits of the two highest dunes, High Dune and Star Dune. Star Dune is actually the highest dune in North America. 7 miles may not sound like a lot, but it’s hard work walking up one side and down the other in loose sand!

Another couple walking the rim of one of the many "bowls". We're right behind them!

There are a lot of people in the park up until the summit of the first dune.

Amy on the summit of High Dune

Then….it gets kind of desolate.

Chris, cresting a dune.

There’s not a WHOLE lot to say about the park. It’s sand. A LOT of sand, in really big piles. But it is beautiful, so we’ll just get on with the pics

The Sangre de Christo Mountains make an amazing and surreal backdrop to the dunes.

Taking a break

Star Dune: if you look really close, you can see Chris at the top. Amy declined to climb this one in favor of hiding from the high winds (full of blowing sand) for a little while.

Our shadows on the next dune over.

Almost back to the start, we are SO tired at this point!

And that’s about it for Saturday! When we got back to the hotel, we were literally covered in sand. It was in our eyes, ears, noses and mouths. It coated our skin. It had gotten into all of our pockets. Chris dumped his boots out while we were still at the park, but Amy did hers at the hotel, and probably had about 3/4 cup of sand in her shoes. We had a great time hiking this amazing and unique natural wonder. Stay tuned for GATOR FARM!

Cara likes to jump up on things for a better view

We spent 2.5 hours on the trail, and walked approximately the same number of miles.  She seemed to have a really great time exploring everything.

Cara walking like a good girl

We saw 3 other people and 2 other puppies.  Cara greeted them nicely and even seemed to want to play with a 1-year-old puppy.  Later, Cara dug her first big hole and got all dirty.

Sitting happily in her hole

Eventually, we sat down and had a quick lunch, then headed back home.  We only walked about half of the trail, but I didn’t want to over-do it!  On the way back we climbed up to a small cave I saw earlier.

Cara didn't want to leave the nice, cool cave

After that, we made our way back to the Jeep.  Cara is going to be a fantastic hiking partner!  All we have to do is work our way up to 6-mile trails (Chris’ typical length for a hike) 

Hi!!

She was adopted one week ago from the Fremont County Humane Society, and even though you wouldnt know it now, she was super shy when we first brought her home. The people at the shelter said that they didnt think that she had been abused, just not socialized. She’s still a little unsure in new situations, but she’ll let anybody pet her, and she seems to love to go hiking!

She’s also very friendly with other dogs, not aggressive at all, and has been *pretty* good with the cats so far. Even though Dusty and Lilly don’t seem to care for her. Dusty has been much more accepting. We got a gate for the door to the office, which really only kind-of works right now, because our big puppy can easily fit herself through the tiny door.

We had to try to make the cat-door smaller, since our dog apparently has no bones...

Cara also likes to go for car rides!

And playing dress-up!

Eve 6 T-Shirt and headphones. Rock on Puppy!

And even though there are lots of cozy cushy things to sleep on, her favorite bed seems to be the bricks in front of the fireplace…

Lazy dog!

As you can see, its been a busy week, but we couldn’t be happier. Cara is wonderful, mellow, and sweet. Puppy kindergarten starts next week, the ultimate goal being the Canine Good Citizen Award!

See you later!

Morphine goes in here

Feeling better, not 100% though…..

A glass of Merlot & Some of the grape vines that made it!

(View from our room)

Chris with a goofy face in front of the mesa

We had a great time tasing wines, and we went to 10 different winerys! We ended up coming home with 20 bottles of wine We also got to taste some locally made vodka, and brandy, which arent exactly Amy’s cup of tea, but Chris seemed to think the peach brandy (100% peaches!) was okay.

All of our new wine!

So, all too soon the weekend was over and it was time to head home, but (as usual) we stopped a few times.

Baby-ffalo

We saw a herd of buffalo, and Buffalo Bill’s grave……

Some guy is buried here.....

Well, thats about it! We had a lot of fun and bought (and drank, lol) a lot of wine Now we just have to find that perfect wine rack!!!

Bear Bag

(it’s that blue thing hanging in the tree.)

We also saw a herd of elk in the park, on our way to the trail head

Elk

The backcountry sites at this park are really nice, they’re far apart, and well maintained, you can see how there’s a nice framed-in flat spot on which to pitch the tent….

Campsite

We also hiked up to see one of the shelters that you can camp in that don’t require a tent, they’re very nice, and i think that next time we go to this park we’ll stay in one

Shelter

Last, but not least, here’s a picture of Boulder Creek that runs along the road to our original destination….

Boulder Creek

Well, thats our weekend! Stay tuned for pictures of Amy’s IV line from her ER visit on Monday night…excitement!!

P.S. Just realized its been exactly a year since our last post….that’s pretty sad….we’ll try to do better!

Chris and some dinosaur footprints on skyline drive, and a view of the very scary drive itself.

The sign on the bridge, and a funny billboard in front of an abandoned tourist trap.

The bridge from below, and from the aerial tramway.

The aerial tramway, and the incline railway.

Bighorn Sheep, and a buffalo.

I think these two speak for themselves, lol.

Two views from our campsite, this park is amazingly beautiful, and amazingly far from absolutely EVERYTHING! The closest thing is a gas station thats about 14 miles away. The surrounding countryside mostly contains antelope (?!) and buffalo farms, and the reservoir contains the biggest crayfish I’ve ever seen. There aren’t really any good pics from paddlefest, the weather was overcast and Amy wasnt feeling too great due to a livid sunburn from Saturday, but all in all, we had a great time