The Lucas Zoo

Of all the things to see I am not even sure which surprised me the most. Vacation this year held a lot of surprises for us to uncover. I have never seen a jelly fish besides at an aquarium but let me tell you they scare the heck out of me. I believe we were on the island 1 day when Matt found the first one. It was not alive and had got washed up in the tide. The next one we found however WAS alive and Matt quickly scooped it into a bucket and put it back in the ocean. Then a few days later while I was walking on the beach I stepped on one, afterwards screaming "I just stepped on a jelly fish, when should it start stinging?" - it was dead so the answer to my question was never but it was still something that I don't want to do again. When we went and visited the fishing pier we must have seen 10 of them swimming around and then there was the one that brushed up against Matt and stung him - slightly but what freaks me out is that we were all out there swimming and it could have been one of the girls. By the end of the week I would just be walking and say "jelly fish" and Matt would come over and see if it was still alive and either save it or toss it by the dunes. I can't be sure but I think that the storm stirred them up. No pictures b/c out of all the sightings I NEVER ONCE had my camera with me, can you believe it?

Hello little dolphins dancing and playing outside of our house - we LOVE watching you! Thanks for gracing us a few times with your presence. I did manage a horrible picture :(

While down at the fishing pier we got to see a King Mackerel get reeled in. A man and his son were fishing and were lucky enough to get one. It was really neat to see the dad struggling with the pole and having his son "help" him to catch the fish. After it was all done (10 minutes or so) the dad said "How do you feel to catch your first big one" - made me tear up. The little boy was so proud. Our girls thought that the big fish was pretty darn cool - all 18.5 pounds of it! No pictures on the pier b/c I was afraid to bring my camera out and look like a total tourist - b/c I am sure they couldn't tell already right?

Each morning we awoke to the shrimp boats and each morning when we opened the blinds the girls would shout "Shrimp Boats!" like it was the first time they had seen them. They liked how the birds seemed to always follow behind. Kids find the smallest things so fascinating - I love it!

Oh how I wish that we would have found this little urchin the day we were leaving rather than a few days before - he might have found a new home in our tank. It was getting to be late but we decided to take just 1 more walk before getting ready for bed and there inside of a sea shell I saw him. If I did not have our salt water tank I would have walked right by but I stopped in my tracks. He was still alive so we threw him back of course and I hope that he made it. I think it is pretty cool that Piper knew what it was too when we showed it to her, not every 3 year old can identify one :)