The Chattanooga Nature Center

After the zoo, we still had a whole afternoon of time to fill. We tried to go to Ruby Falls, but it was so crowded when we got there. It was about an hour plus wait just to get down into the cave, so we decided that with two antsy kids, that we would save that activity for another time. I was kind of bummed that we couldn't do it. That is one of my favorite places to go in Chattanooga. We didn't go earlier because I honestly didn't think they would let us take such young children on - I learned to do a little bit better research next time! Since we had some time to kill, we went to the Chattanooga Nature Center. It is a trail through the woods that leads up to a wildlife conservancy area. They had some wolves their, a bald eagle, a hawk, some owls, and a bobcat. Mikayla particularly liked the bald eagle. She had just purchased a bald eagle at the zoo (even though we didn't see any there...) and her eagle was on our adventure with us. She liked comparing her eagle with the real one.
Mikayla with her eagle.
The had a tree house there that was literally built around the trees. It was pretty neat to see.

A picture of Gavin just being cute! After the hike through the woods, you can drive through their "botanical gardens." I put this in quotation marks, because it just seemed to be a drive through the woods and near the river. It was very pretty, but I wouldn't exactly call it a botanical garden. We did get to see a blue heron on the river which was pretty neat.

As you can see, we had alot of fun on our mini-vacation. We learned some things about traveling with multiple children, that should hopefully help us in the future. Mikayla had alot of fun playing in the indoor pool. She even got a little brave (in my opinion a little too much) about trying to swim without her floaties. She's getting better everyday with that skill. I can't believe how fast she is growing up! I am really glad that we had this time together as a family - it was a wonderful weekend!