Nashville, Tennessee

 

Jacob and I finally made it to Virginia, where we will be living for the next 4 months! On our journey here we stopped at Nashville one night and spent a few hours there the next day! I really enjoyed Nashville, and I can't wait to go back for a longer visit, and explore even more! 

The first night we were there we went and ate at Ted's Montana Grill. It was delicious and I love how it is decorated with buffalo (kinda in love with buffalo ever since Yellowstone). I didn't like how buffalo is on the menu, makes me sad!

Then we drove around and saw the beautiful city lights and drove by the Frist Museum and saw these HUGE, beautiful roses with HUGE, cute bugs on them! I loved them so much, so we stopped and took tons of pictures even though it was freezing outside (the real feel was at -6 degrees! Brr!).

The next day we parked and walked around "Broadway" which is full of bars and souvenir shops, where I bought post cards and magnets! We went into the Visitor's Center and these kind gentlemen told us we had to take pictures with the guitars and microphone they had available (so we could trick our friends into thinking we became famous, of course)! Broadway was really fun (and cute!) during the day so I bet it's amazing at night, can't wait to see one day!

Then we drove over to the Centennial Park. On one sign we read it said that the United Nations met there once, which I thought was extremely cool. Then we went over and saw The Parthenon. It is so beautiful. It is the world's only replica of The Parthenon of Greek Culture. The original temple was dedicated to Athena, Greek Goddess of Wisdom. I do recommend everyone going and checking it out if you are ever in Nashville!

Then we drove over the the Grand Ole Opry, but we weren't allowed inside...meh. So we just took pictures outside and daydreamed about what it looked like inside...hopefully one day we will be able to see!

Seeing Nashville for the first time was a great start to our adventure. I can't wait to see more of Virginia and what it has to offer and the surrounding states!! 

Wild Wilderness Safari.

 

 Yesterday Jacob and I drove up to Gentry, Arkansas to check out the Wild Wilderness Safari that we have heard such wonderful things about...and I'm so glad we did! We had a blast!

We got to play with 3 month old lion cubs, named Kiara and Kovu, such an amazing experience! They are feisty little things and like to bite and claw, but they aren't strong enough to actually hurt you yet....even though I was not near as brave as Jacob, that crazy boy let them go near his face! Haha, I did get the cutest picture ever though because of it. Now we can check playing with baby lions off of our bucket list!

While there we also got to feed a momma and baby giraffe. How insane are their tongues?  They were licking our hands and face (gross but also very cool) while we were feeding them lettuce. Then we got to feed little lemurs (their hands are so soft and dainty!) And then we got to go play with kangaroos! Can you believe it! Haha, they are so cute and fun. We were in a pin with about 7 or 8 of them. They let us pet them and feed them. It was amazing!

After playing and petting all the cute animals we got to go on a drive through safari in our car! We got to see all kinds of things like white buffalo (so beautiful), Texas longhorns (so massive), zebras (they came right up to the car and I got to pet one!), camels, ostriches, and all kinds of different animals. Really neat! In huge pins along the drive they also had tigers, bears, lions, and even some ligers. Crazy! First time to ever see a liger in real life!

We had a blast and I'm looking forward to going back someday with the rest of my family. I really enjoyed this so much more than an actual zoo because we are able to interact more with the animals and the animals seem to be very well taken care of and they are all given such nice homes and tons of attention.

Yellowstone National Park Day 1.

 

First I want to start off by saying that Yellowstone Park is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. (Actually it is the MOST beautiful, I love it there). Jacob and I had a wonderful time and I'm so glad that we were able to travel up there!! 

We started off our first day sitting by the fire with fire warmed cinnamon rolls and hot chocolate (yummy!)...and then it started raining (blah!) It rained pretty much all morning but finally stopped around 1:00 (thank the Lord!). While it was raining though we had the opportunity to go check out a lot of the geysers, caldrons, and springs! They were so cool, but pictures just don't do them justice, luckily I took some videos of them to be able to show my family! While driving to this area of the park we saw our first buffalo! Those things are massive!! We were so excited to see it and we were so close that while I was taking a picture (inside the car with my window down) it snorted and I felt it's breath on my arm! Scary but cool!

After that we headed to the Yellowstone Grand Canyon, (it is what most of the pictures above are of). It was just breathtaking and in my opinion even more beautiful then the Grand Canyon. It had a beautiful waterfall and river going down the middle, I loved it! We hiked to the very bottom of the waterfall (over 200 stairs, pretty scary, but so worth it!)  and then we went and viewed the crest of the waterfall which was amazing! There was a beautiful rainbow at the bottom (1st picture). I was in love!!!

Then we found a store because curly hair and rain does not make a good match! I got my bangs and hair straightened up...(haha I'm such a girl). And while there we ran into this monstrous stuffed moose! I had (well I still have him) a stuffed moose named Melvin when I was little whom I absolutely loved so I had to take a picture with the big Melvin! :) 

After that we went by a quiet stream and just laid around and relaxed with each other, it was nice and peaceful. After that we headed over to see Old Faithful. It was such a cool thing to see, I'm so glad we had the opportunity. (A picture of it below the Old Faithful sign photo!)

That night we roasted marshmallows by the fire, then ate soup while star gazing. The night sky there is unbelievable. It's so gorgeous, I was obsessed, hundreds and hundreds of stars. I also saw the biggest shooting star I've ever seen and finally got to see the Milky Way. SO BEAUTIFUL!! I wish I could have taken a gazillion pictures of it.

So there is Day 1 of our trip in a nutshell! I can't wait to share the rest of our trip with yall!