Monkey Jungle - "It's my birthday!"

Come on in and join the party, you're all invited even if you're tardy. It is time to do some monkey business!

Uday took me and Mom to Monkey Jungle in Miami, for my birthday after we both worked a few hours in the morning and took a half day off as my birthday fell on a Monday this year. We took a few pictures of us as well but we were all pretty tired and the monkeys look much better in the pictures than we do so I did not add us this time. With the exception of pictures of Uday because he was acting like a monkey anyway! Monkey Jungle is a small park that took us more time to drive to than the amount of time needed to see it completely, but it was nice to be around the wildlife for a change instead of being at work.



In some places at Monkey Jungle the monkey's are not caged in and you can feed them in a cup with a string that they pull up to the roof and eat. Uday was having fun doing this as you can see below.


Smile pretty for the camera!!


Dazed and confused...


There were a few other creatures there in addition to monkeys and they were interesting as well...



This Gorilla looks like he is contemplating life and how to create World Peace!


Everyone's favorite at this park were the Mandrills. We had never see a species like this in person and they are just fascinating. Mandrills are the largest of the monkey family (unlike the Gorilla and Orangutan which are the great Apes). We felt bad that these ones were in a cage that was too small. We talked to a person that works there and he agreed and he told us that they are working on fixing this by moving one of them to a new location.



They yawn a lot especially when they are feeling some tension. They have very large sharp teeth!



This Orangutan looked a little sad, but I found it interesting to watch and take pictures of her.



She still has a sense of humor!!


This was a fun little trip seeing the monkeys before we went out for Thai food for my birthday dinner... Thanks to Mom and Uday for all of your love and gifts!

Click on the picture below to see a short video from Monkey Jungle:

Videos from trip to U.S. & British Virgin Islands

On keeping with the theme of Making the World a More Creative Place, I finally got around to editing the videos and setting them to music from our trip to the Virgin Islands. It has almost been a year since we visited the Virgin Islands... my, how fast time goes. What fun it is looking back at a trip after some time especially on video. It takes one right back to feeling like he/she was there again. For those of you who have not yet visited these Islands, I hope these video's give you a good idea of what these places have to offer and a tool to planing your next trip!

There are several videos that I made of our trip and they go in order of our itinerary. Just click on the picture in each category to see the video.

The first one is of St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands... click on the picture below to see the video:


The second one is of St. John, U.S. Virgin Islands, (partI)... click on the picture below to see the video:


The next one is of Virgin Gorda, British Virgin Islands... click on the picture below to see the video:


Then St. John, U.S. Virgin Islands, (partII)... click on the picture below to see the video:


and finally, St. John U.S. Virgin Islands, (partIII). Click on the picture below to see the video:


Hope you enjoy the videos and have an easier time planning your trip to the Virgin Islands. These Islands are a definite, "must see"!!

Bike Riding at Riverbend Park, Jupiter Florida

The weather was perfect, warm and sunny with a small cool breeze. We brought one bike and rented another (for $10 for the whole day) and we were on our way to explore the great outdoors. We have been to this park canoeing before (called Canoe Outfitters), but we never got to go through the biking and walking trails until this Thanksgiving weekend. Although we visited other parks this weekend and had fun taking pictures of nature, I was looking forward to enjoying the freedom and exercise outdoors.







There were a lot of Tiki Huts along the way where we eventually had our picnic lunch that we packed. I have a fondness for Tiki Huts so much that I had my wedding reception in one.




We came to a Christmas Tree patch and I thought the Florida looking Christmas Tree was funny, coming from a New England perspective. It reminds me of the Charlie Brown Christmas tree, but for the record the real ones that people buy around here appear to be from up North.



We still could not resist taking some pictures but this time spent more time on our bikes. Since I did not take too many pictures and we were sometimes in motion they are not the best pictures so I did have some fun touching them up in order to make them more interesting.


Uday and I found another colorful grasshopper that we took turns taking pictures of and I took the first one where it is besides it's shadow. Uday took most of the rest. We both still find these grasshoppers so interesting especially their mouth.

Arthur Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge & Wakodahatchee Wetlands on Thanksgiving Weekend

Due to car problems this weekend we had to change our plans from going on a long road trip to visit some state parks up north, to simply visiting some locally. We got the car fixed and met up with our friend Scott to check out two local parks. Scott, Uday and I all enjoy taking pictures of nature and had a great time together. The first park we went to is called Arthur Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge. We did not see too much so we only stayed here for a short time but I managed to get a few pictures of the wildlife there. The picture above is also one from that park as well as the next few below.




Then Scott took us to another park that he was at earlier that day before meeting up with us and this was such a pleasant surprise! This is a free park and it is full of wildlife. Uday and I were amazed at how much we saw and how difficult it was to share our one camera with each other. This park is called Wakodahachee Wetlands. Here are a few our our favorite pictures that we captured on this day.


We saw many birds, turtles and alligators at this park among other wildlife!


Here is a picture of Scott doing his favorite hobby... (he takes awesome pictures and some of them can be seen on his Outlanders website and for those who know him, on his Facebook).


Here are more of our nature pictures taken at this same park...



























This picture below was one of the highlight's of the park! It is not often that one sees an Otter in south Florida and I was able to capture it on camera! It was a lot of fun to watch!


This is Scott's favorite Bird! Can you believe these two pictures are of the same bird!!


































A nice couple took this picture of Uday and I and Scott also took pictures of Uday and I on his camera.


A nice moon in broad daylight!


Two nature adventurers captured! Thanks for showing us these parks Scott.


When we got home we found a few more nature pictures we could not resist taking... I love this one! These birds stand on the ducks out here every day!


We often see these birds in my mom's neighborhood and finally got to take some pictures of them. They are beautiful birds.


Uday and I were having a little competition with our close-up shots. I took the one below:



and Uday took this one below...


Which picture do you like the best?