Lions and Tigers and... LIVE chickens!

We just wanted to get out of Shanghai for a few days and so we headed to Hangzhou (small town of 6 million), where another Olmsted family lives with 2 little boys. The kids like to play with each other and we have a good time swapping stories.

Everytime we have gotten together with these friends, someone has seriously been sick! This time it was Tim's turn (self-induced) -- he woke Sunday morning with a light-sensitive, nearly swollen-shut eye. So he stayed in bed most of the day in the dark, but woke up Monday morning feeling good enough to venture out to the Hangzhou Safari! We couldn't figure out what was wrong with his eye, it didn't seem to get better after two full days, but he seemed to be getting used to the discomfort. He just kept saying that it felt like something was in there, but couldn't see anything in there. As we were packing our bags to head home on Tuesday morning... Tim goes into the bathroom and takes a good look at his eye in the mirror. He noticed something resembling a contact lens and sure enough, he pulled his contact that he hadn't realized he was still wearing. Within 1 hour the redness was gone and his eye was amazingly healed!

.....

We headed to the Hangzhou Animal Safari, an experience you won't find in America. We drove with our friends in their car around the outer road stopping along the way to look at the wild animals. If you choose, you can buy some food they are selling and throw it to the animals. Different animals had different items for purchase.

First we came to the Grizzly Bears and threw some apples. You can see the green apple in the top right-center of the pic that the bear stood up to catch... and he did!

Next came the wolves, you could throw them raw meat, they were all over it. Adayla and Tally were interested in watching, but not interested in throwing the meat.

The next part is where it got interesting....the tigers! You can feed them raw meat or you can buy them a whole live chicken.




So for 30 RMB($4.50) we had ourselves a chicken to throw to the tigers.



(By the way, do you know how many people that little silver-blue car behind me can hold? 5 adults and 5 kids! Amazing! Who needs SUVs or minivans?!)

On to the show: 3... 2... 1... Throw him to his death Morgan! Cheer on kids!!

Happy Tiger!



We passed on feeding the lions, kind of boring! This was all good times and I am pleased that you are reading this here on the blog written by me instead of on CNN.com.... you know, something like, "some dumb Americans in China thought it would be fun to throw live chickens to tigers and were mauled in the process."

So we were able to move onto the next part of our Safari adventure. This part you stay in the car and the animals come to you. We bought some branches with leaves on them and pretty soon you have lots of new friends chasing after your car....

And before long, he is in your car!

Then the camels want in on the food as well.

Our friends boys were LOVING it! They had been a few times before. Our girls were very interested in seeing the animals, they did not want them in the car, however!

Finally we headed into the more zoo like area of the park, but you can still feed many of the animals. These were the friendly little Red Pandas or as the Chinese call them the Lesser Panda. Adayla and Tally both warmed up to them and thought it was quite fun to feed them.

Then this is Tim and Tally feeding the lemurs. I am thankful we went in the hot season, our friends said that if you go when the temp is comfy they will happily hop onto you! And it was hot -- this day was 101 degrees, and humid.

I know this makes you all want to buy your tickets to China for a visit... Product Safety? What's that?!