After a great first two days in Nashville, we were all excited to tackle day number three! This day (Thursday) was the one the kids were probably most excited about because our day included a visit to the Nashville Zoo!
Jeremy and his family had not been to the Nashville Zoo before, so when we told them our plans for after Kaylee's graduation, they made plans to join us for our zoo day. This made our zoo day extra special, for sure!
Mallory, Brooke, JT, Chris, Brecklyn, Brianna, Brenson, Jeremy, Kaylee, Shawna, and Chelle
The Nashville Zoo has two main areas . . . one side of the zoo is shaded and lush while the other side is much more exposed to the sun and desert-like. Unknowingly, we chose to walk through the shaded, lush exhibits first (in the morning) and the more exposed exhibits after we ate lunch. Next time (especially if it's summertime), we will go through the zoo in the opposite direction!
One of the first exhibits we came to was the Kangaroo Kickabout. Now, we have kangaroos at our home zoo, but this was a totally different experience because the Nashville Zoo allows guests to walk a winding path through an enclosure with the kangaroos!
It was so great to watch the kangaroos up close and personal!
The best part, though, was that we were also allowed to pet the kangaroos that were on the pathway. A zookeeper was standing by monitoring everything, but this was an experience we were not expecting!
Brooke and Brecklyn petting a kangaroo
Brenson and Brecklyn petting a kangaroo
How incredible is this?!?
After having that experience right off the bat, I kind of felt like our day was made! However, there were many other good exhibits to enjoy!
Chris, Brooke, Brianna, and JT
Mallory, Chelle, Shawna, Brianna, Kaylee, Brooke, and Brecklyn
This little guy was pretty fascinating to us!
Chelle and Kaylee in front of the flamingo habitat . . . or "fawingos" as Brecklyn says :-)
After we walked one entire side of the zoo, we were ready for lunch! There were several places to get food on the property, so we found a place where we could all sit together and ordered food. Lunch was a nice break, but we were ready to get back to animal sighting as soon as we were finished eating.
Our next "big" stop was the Lorikeet Landing. This was another very impressive, hands-on exhibit. We were permitted to walk through an aviary that housed about 50 colorful, friendly, and noisy lorikeet parrots. We purchased food to feed the beautiful birds, and the kids loved doing this.
Brianna and Daddy
Brenson
Daddy and Brecklyn
Daddy and Brooke
If you stood still enough, the birds would land on your shoulder or finger. Chris loved this!
JT also enjoyed playing with the birds!
After visiting the lorikeets, we trekked on to the African Savannah. This was about the time we were wishing we had went to Africa when we first arrived at the zoo that morning, haha!
Interesting . . .
While in Africa, we found a place to sit for a while and have a treat while watching the giraffes. A cold treat was just what this hot day called for!
This zoo was a lot of walking (and hilly!), so we were thankful that we brought the double stroller for the kids. At one point, we thought it would be funny if I pushed Kaylee in her wheelchair while she pushed the girls in the stroller. It was funny for a few minutes, but I was the one doing most of the work so it didn't last long :-).
We were finished exploring the zoo by about 3:00 that afternoon. It was a great experience, and I'm so thankful we went! If you are in the Nashville area, I definitely recommend paying a visit to the zoo.
After leaving the zoo, my crew went back to our hotel room to take showers and get ready for our dinner plans. I mentioned in a previous post that my long-time friend, Adam, and his family live in Nashville. It had been a hot minutes since we'd seen them, but we were thrilled when it worked out for us to get together for dinner while we were in town.
Adam and his wife, Sharon, have three children. We were quite the crew with four adults and seven kids! Olive Garden didn't even see us coming, haha!
I think it had been about six years since we'd gotten together with Adam and his family. What that meant for my kids is that they didn't remember them at all (and the twins had never met them). I was a little concerned with how things would go with the kids, but I had ZERO reason to worry! Brianna and Brenson got along so well with Nathan (who's 13) and Reagan (who's 10). I've known Adam since we were in high school, and Nathan is definitely his mini in looks and personality! Add in the fact that he and Brianna really hit it off and it was like flashing back to 20 years ago. We were quite entertained by them :-).
Everyone was getting along so well and having such a good time visiting that we decided to follow up Olive Garden with a visit to Chick-Fil-A for ice cream. Brianna and Brenson even rode with Adam and his family in their van. It truly made my heart happy to see how well they all clicked.
Brecklyn, Brianna, Emmalynn, Reagan, Brooke, Brenson, and Nathan
Sharon, Adam, Chelley, and Chris
These two girls played so well together that it made me sad we don't see each other more often. They actually hatched up a plan for us all to get together again the next day so they could have more play time!
When we finally got back to our hotel that night, it was after 10pm and everyone crashed hard! It was worth it to spend time with old friends and kindle new friendships, though!
Because Thursday was a late night, we took things pretty slow on Friday morning. It was close to 10:00am before we left our hotel for the day. Our plan for Friday was to go downtown and walk the "strip". We wanted to experience the NashVegas side of Nashville where all the music magic happens!
We parked the van in a parking garage and made getting coffee our first stop. The kids were excited to experience the city in a new way!
We walked for well over a mile to get out of the business district of downtown and more into music row. We truly do not mind walking because it helps us really experience the flavor of the city. It wasn't as crazy as many cities we've been in, but there was definitely a hustle and bustle to it!
One of the stops on our "must-do" list was to see Ryman Auditorium, where so much music magic has happened.
I'm sure the kids didn't fully (or even partially) appreciate the significance of this stop, but I enjoyed it!
Brooke, Brenson, Brianna, and Brecklyn standing on the steps of the Ryman Auditorium
As we neared music row, there was something to see in every direction we looked. It was almost a little overwhelming!
Brenson and Brianna in front of Bridgestone Arena
I always enjoy the buzz of a big city . . . to visit for a while then return to my quiet home!
Honky Tonk Row!
Just looking at these photos I can hear all the music and noise of this unique part of the city! So much live music! I think this was a pretty eye opening experience for our kiddos. It was before lunch time on a weekday, but there was all kinds of drinking and craziness going on. Just the way some people were dressed made their little eyes pop out a bit. Because we weren't sure what we might be exposed to, we walked through pretty quickly!
We stopped at a visitor's center to use the bathroom and cool down a bit. The girls had to take turns singing in the mic!
Brianna
Brooke
Brecklyn
Just up the road from the craziness of Honky Tonk Row was the old customs house and train station. Amazing architecture!
(You can barely see the kids and me on the front steps of the customs house)
So beautiful!
This is the old Union Station which is now a hotel.
We had been told that we definitely needed to go inside Union Station (which is now a hotel lobby). It was gorgeous inside, and I'm so glad we took that advice!
Photos just can't do it justice.
I found Nashville to be unique partially because it felt a little disjointed. It didn't feel like we drove long at all to leave downtown and arrive at another Nashville attraction that felt totally and completely different from any other part of the city. Located in a quaint and quiet park, The Parthenon of Nashville is a full-sized replica of The Parthenon in Athens. Who knew?!?
Brianna, Brenson, Brecklyn, and Brooke in front of The Parthenon
Adam, Nathan, and Reagan met up with us here to tour The Parthenon (which they've done multiple times). I will say, I was not impressed with the inside of the building. It houses this giant gold statute that is hideous and aside from a little history, there is nothing else to it.
The structure is massive!
In the photo above, you can see all the steps leading up to the entrance. Well, not long after Adam and his kids got there, Brecklyn fell face first down those steps. It was so scary! Thankfully, she was okay, but she did have a good and loud cry. Nothing like falling face-first down the largest steps in the city *sigh*.
After our somewhat brief Parthenon tour, we bought popsicles for all the kiddos and let them play on a playground adjacent to The Parthenon lawn for about an hour while Chris and I visited with Adam. It was great to have that time with them!
Not too far down the road from The Parthenon is Bellmont University and Lipscomb University. I wanted to drive through both campuses while we were close, so that was next on our agenda. Lipscomb is where Adam attended (and we were very close while he was a student there), and I have a cousin who attended Bellmont. My Granny told me that we had to drive through the campus because it was impressive and beautiful, and she was right! I was glad to be able to do both of those things, even though all the kids fell asleep while we were driving :-). Chris and I took the opportunity to enjoy the peace and quiet in the van!
That evening, Chris really wanted to eat somewhere local. Upon Adam's recommendation, we went to a place called Prince's Hot Chicken.
(No smoking except for the chicken)
I think had the timing been different, we would have really enjoyed this experience. However, we were all hot, tired, and hungry when we got there, and it ended up being a 45 minutes wait for food.
Brooke, Daddy, and Brecklyn
Bren, Momma, and Brianna
The chicken ended up being crazy hot (spicy), and the kids would barely touch their food. Even mine was a little warm for my taste (and I got the medium hot)!
Once we were back at the hotel, the kids wanted to swim again. Each night while at the pool, Brianna played with a little girl named Conley that was vacationing with her grandparents. After we finished swimming, Conley and my kids played a little mini golf (that was on site), then we all enjoyed a fire in a nice outdoor space behind the hotel. Conley and her grandparents are from a town in southeastern Arkansas, and she had quite the southern accent. I say this often because it's so true . . . we attract kids and it seems like we always have an extra no matter where we go!
We had really packed a ton of fun into our time in Nashville, and we had one more day to enjoy. My next post will be about our last day of sightseeing fun, as well as our trip home.
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