A day at the Zoo

Yesterday we decided to visit grottos. In principles it seemed like a fabulous idea. They were big and impressive, there was a little boat (looking like a Viking Ship according to the brochure) and a train ride. What more do you need to impress two little boys and a big kid? Not much else really but it turned into a near nightmare within the first five minutes.

The vertigo kicked in as soon as we entered the grotto when we were greeted by a big hole and we were told that we would have to walk down 350 steps to the bottom! Now I don’t know if you have vertigo but for anyone who has it badly like me looking at your precious kids hanging on the fence looking down make you need a dose of valium to ease the shock!

Mild panic set in as Victor decided that a place like this deserved to welcome a new Indiana Jones. While we were in motion it was all fine but as soon as we stopped it became hell. They both started to climb everything and I was scared that they would either fall down a hole or manage to break the sound system that they were attracted to like bees to sweet stuff!

The problem was that we had to follow the guided tour and it stopped A LOT. Each time we were given the same information in French, Italian and Spanish, so we had to wait A LOT.

And there was that woman holding the group because she wanted a picture of her two year old son in front of EVERY stalactite and stalagmite of the grotto. And every shot didn’t take a quick 30 seconds but a good few minutes, because she was crap at taking pictures and had to take the shot over and over again… I was this close to making her eat her camera when I was standing behind her, waiting to sit on the boat (which was no bigger than a rowing boat by the way) holding the rest of the party mid air between ground and water!

Oh and there was a group of Italians with us and they were constantly looking at the boys saying stuff I didn’t understand and touching their hair and cheeks. They were fascinated by their blond hair. Each time they were touching Victor he would hit them and growl like a tiger. I didn’t particularly tell him off as I can understand how invasive it must feel to be handheld by strangers double your size, so deep down it was more “You go son!”.
One even ended up following us everywhere and held Victor’s hand at every opportunity. It was a bit freaky at times especially when we were going down the stairs and she was pulling him forward while I was trying my best to go at his pace. Anyway maybe I should have offered a rental fee while we were in the grottos and I could have enjoyed the visit in peace…

Today we decided that the Zoo would be a much better idea to give the boys more space to run around safely. And it did just the job. They were very excited to see lots of animals and loved running and running and running…

It was a lovely day.