A rerun ....for some.....armchair travel for others

I just watched "ghost and the darkness"

All about lions . And Val Kilmer wasn't lookin' too bad either. It reminded me of last years vacation, where Poodles (desert dirt diva) and I went to the "big cat " preserve. it was one of the most awesome experiences of my life (so far) .:)

Since some of y'all didn't read my blog last year ....here is the rerun ...in all it's glory. hope you enjoy the trip!

Eureka !!! part one

I’m back ya’ll. My vacation is over. I took Poodles to the airport yesterday. On the way there , I had taken a benedryl for my puffy allergy eyes and man…. All the way home I could barely stay awake. I was slapping my cheeks, chain smoking and still about to fall asleep.I got home and went straight to nap time. LOL Then went to bed at 9 on top of that.




Cavuto woke me up this morning at 4:28.ack!!!! why ??? why does he do this???Why not 7 ?




I have to go back to work today , so I will try and recap what I can , right now while the hair color is cooking on my head.




We spent a couple days going out on the boat. One day Floozie 2 and Conehead went with us. We had a blast . Poodles and I got in a melted chocolate fight.




My aunt LOO LOO came and spent the night with us one night. And we all went to an actual bar….to hear E’s husband sing Karaoke.We had no idea how expensive bars had become NOR were we prepared for the behavior of the younger generation. We were shocked and disgusted. Some girl was having a birthday party and her and her friends (female friends ,mind you) were lap dancing each other, kissing each other on the dance floor . Etc….



We did not really know what to make of it. It was reminiscent of what Sodom and Gomorrah must have been like.



Other than that part, we had fun. We danced a little , drank very little (too expensive) lol and we were out of there by 11.We listened to Englad2 sing and there was a little cowboy there who was about to get a record deal, he was an awesome singer. We got his autograph. Lol




Then it was off to our road trip…. The drive seemed FOREVER. We got to Branson on our first night. Our hotel was nothing to write home about. We checked in and went to the old downtown area. There were tons of antique stores and an old main street area. But guess what? Everything closed at 5:00 P.M.




So then it was off to find somewhere to eat dinner. We wanted something that wasn’t a chain , so we went in one place.”closed for remodeling” We drove around and saw buffet after buffet.The whole town seemed to be one big “strip” with motels, buffets and t-shirt stores. We finally wound up eating at Mickey Gilleys. AND I was allowed to smoke in there.:) We both had chicken fried steak . And it was yummy.




The next morning we went out to the lobby for our free breakfast and the place was packed with a bus load of senior citizens. We had to stand and wait for a table.





Then we checked out and headed for the outlet malls. We went to both of them and they were so expensive neither one of us bought anything. Then we headed for Eureka Springs. We could not find the road that map quest told us to take so we had to go the long way. Once we got there we both fell in love with Eureka Springs. It was a really old town up in the hills , with shops and brick sidewalks.it reminded me very much of Manitou Springs Colorado.We looked in tons of little shops and took pictures of old houses ,and sights along the way.I saw a man wearing a skirt . Not a kilt mind you, but a brown skirt ……looked like carhart material. The cops rode around on bicycles. I took a picture of one of them and then realized I had a picture of more than I thought. Lol





We went in some Italian place and ordered Italian beef sandwiches. Well , they were totally repulsive! The aus jus was like thick onion soup. We said “um , these are awful and we can not eat them” The girl said “we’ve never had a complaint.” So poodles goes”well, she used to live in Chicago!” lol like that explains everything.





Then ,still starving, we took a trolley back to where the truck was parked and headed off for the cat preserve to check in to our tree house.We check in and it really is sort of like a tree house. A few steps above camping. It had a kitchen and air conditioning and a very small bathroom. It was awesome. It had a pull down ladder to get to the beds up in the loft ,which felt very much like a box spring with no mattress. Lol



I’m scared of the ladder in my garage and was not looking forward to trying to navigate that thing in the dark. There was no light up in the loft , just a flashlight.





We unpacked a little and then walked over to see the cats.They were just incredible.The tigers were enormous! And the sounds they make sounded like the dinosaurs on Jurasic Park. They had cougars, lions, tigers, bears , a monkey , a black leopard and a bobcat I think. But I tell you , if you were out in the wild and heard that noise …you would be scared to death!!





We took the walking tour , where one of the interns told us about each cat.A lot of them were there because people tried to have them as pets and later, realized how stupid that was. So they can not be returned to the wild. And some of them have been declawed and had their fangs removed.(this was done on the panther with a pair of pliers)





And others were there because people had been breeding them for profit .Especially the white tigers. They were breeding a brother and sister. Some of the cats are deformed because of this inbreeding.And several of the cats came from a raid ,where they were being mistreated and malnourished .





The intern told us that in the state of Texas alone , there are more tigers kept in captivity than there are tigers in the wild.





The cats have habitats ,which are big grassy enclosures where they have room to run and live like they are not in a cage ,but these habitats cost a lot of money and are not yet available for all of the cats. The cats in temporary housing are in large cage type enclosures, they have logs and a little den. Some of them had a big horse water tub.But the goal is for all of them to get their own habitat. So if you have any excess money lying around …please donate to Turpentine creek. It was a wonderful ,clean and caring place.





Ok , back to my tale…. We are still starving all this time. Lol After the tour we wait until 5 to watch them feed the cats. They eat mostly raw chicken. This place is in Tyson chicken farm country , so 90 percent of their food is donated by Tyson chicken. The bears eat dog chow and vegetables.




They bring the cats food around in a big wheel barrow and throw it in through the top of the cage .I expected them to voraciously go after the food like a “wild animal” lol but they didn’t , they delicately ate it , just like a house cat.




They also played and acted very much like enormous house cats. One tiger was playing in his big water tub acting just like cavuto does. It was adorable!






We were 7 miles from town and decided to go the other way to the gas station and buy bread and just eat sandwiches out of the stuff we brought with us. Well , all the gas station had was hot dog buns. Ack! Forget it , we drove all the way back the other direction to Eureka springs and wound up eating at a Bavarian Restaurant.It was pretty late when we got back to our tree house. So we walked around a little, took more pictures and then tried sitting on the porch. We were run off by giant palmetto bugs.So then we decide that we are not willing to sleep up in that loft. The couch turns into a very small bed , it was called a “clicker couch” the back folds down by the seat and there you have it. So we were both willing to cram into that thing rather than go up the ladder into the dark and maybe buggy loft. Lol






We hear the cougars out in the dark ..making these huge dinosaur noises , then we hear “meow”


We thought we were losing it. Lol




“didn’t that sound like a regular cat?”

“yeah , I thought I was hearing things.”

Go to PART 2..........