Our Family Vacation to Dauphin Island: Leaving the Beach and a Visit to the Jackson Zoological Park

Our last day at the beach, a storm started moving in in the evening.  The first wave wasn't too bad, but at 3:00 in the morning we all were woken up to a very strong thunderstorm!  It only lasted about an hour and the skies were clear by the time we had to get up and load the van.

Sometimes when you are on vacation, the last day or so you are so ready to go home and get in your own bed.  Not this time.  I could've stayed on the beach forever!  We are really hoping to go back again next year.

To make the drive easier on the children, we decided to stop in Jackson Mississippi on the way home.  We had seen that there was a zoo there, so we thought we would spend the night, get up in the morning, visit the zoo, and head home.  We found a Comfort Inn that was only a few miles from the zoo in what seemed like a pretty decent area of SW Jackson.  The Comfort Inn was horrible!  The non smoking rooms reeked of cigarette smoke, the bathroom door inside the rooms did not close, the bathroom had a strange odor, the outside door did not seal properly and the latch did not completely close (I pushed the table in front of the door when we went to sleep), and the "continental breakfast" did not hardly have anything.  I was told our rooms were next door to each other and it ended up that there were 6 rooms in between them.  It was the not the worst hotel I had ever seen, but my advice to anyone staying in the area: Drive a few more miles to Clinton and spend a few more dollars for the Hampton Inn.

Anyway, we got up the next morning and surprised the children with a visit to the Jackson Zoological Park.  The zoo is not in a good part of town, but the zoo itself was pretty good for a city zoo.  Children 2-12 cost $6 and adults were $9.  Several areas were under renovation, but there were plenty of animals to see.  It is very shady with plenty of benches and picnic tables to sit at and water spritzers throughout to cool off.  There was a play area and it looked as though they are building a splash park for children.  The only area that was really disappointing was the petting zoo.  There were chickens that you couldn't touch, sheep that you couldn't touch, and 3 goats and a pig that you could touch.  It took us around 3 hours to go through the whole thing.  The children really enjoyed it and it was a great mini trip before we headed home.

Emmie loved the flamingos and sat down and cried when it was time to move on.

As we were on our way home, we got some news that Art's mom who had been in the hospital for a few day had gotten much worse and was in ICU and on a respirator.  We went home and took care of a few things at the house, made arrangements for the children, and plane reservations for Art, Emelia, and I to fly to New York and spend a few days.  This post is scheduled for the day after we leave, but it may be my last one for a few days unless I have some down time in an area that has WiFi.  Prayers for Art's mom, our travels, and my parents who are caring for 6 of our children would be greatly appreciated!