By this point, the boys had seen enough National Parks, Memorials, Historic Places, and such. Collin saw this place called “Reptile Gardens” and lobbied hard that it should be in our itinerary. So here we go and it was a blast.
What you see above is an alligator wrangler. He was alone in a pen with roughly twenty alligators any one of which could have easily taken him on if they cared to. He did explain they do a good job of keeping the alligators fed and that goes a long way toward keeping them “happy” shall we say? But there was a tense moment or two as he demonstrated how to sit on one and hold his mouth shut. The alligators you see behind him only came up out of the water after the wrangler got involved in his demo. In the end, the wrangler was just fine and it was very entertaining (from a safe distance outside the pen).
Other fun here at Reptile Gardens included other demonstrations including exotic birds and snakes. There was a “petting” zoo area of tortoises and an extensive display of many rare and very dangerous snakes from the world over. It was an impressive place if you’re into reptiles that is.
