{"id":697,"date":"2011-12-26T16:18:00","date_gmt":"2011-12-26T16:18:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2011\/12\/the-santa-train-and-zoo-lights.html"},"modified":"2012-04-30T22:19:33","modified_gmt":"2012-05-01T03:19:33","slug":"the-santa-train-and-zoo-lights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2011\/12\/the-santa-train-and-zoo-lights.html","title":{"rendered":"Alabama Discoveries 1: The Santa Train and Zoo Lights!"},"content":{"rendered":"
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We had a fun couple days sightseeing and enjoying some of the local holiday traditions. \u00a0Dave’s finally getting his “travel legs” back after his surgery and on Friday withstood about 4 hours in the car, to and from the Foley, Alabama area.<\/p>\n

We live about 1 1\/2 hours from the Wales West RV Park…and Tourist Railroad<\/a>. \u00a0Yes, if you can imagine the two businesses coexisting, that’s what we have. \u00a0It’s tucked deep in a rural town in Alabama, east of Mobile….<\/p>\n

Okay, an aside here: I’m not sure what you officially call that part of Alabama that’s due west of the Florida Panhandle and has the Gulf of Mexico as its southern border. \u00a0I always thought of it as a “stem”. \u00a0I did some cursory research and determined it could be either “South Alabama” or “Lower Alabama”. \u00a0Wikipedia didn’t offer too much help<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n

…anyway, this RV Park offers Welsh Narrow Gauge<\/a> train rides on weekends, and in December they had an adorable Santa Train experience.<\/p>\n

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After dark, the train takes riders throughout the extensive RV park, which is brilliantly lit up. \u00a0You ride to the far eastern side of the park, where you’re dropped off: Santa Claus is waiting for the kids in his “North Pole” workshop. \u00a0The kids meet Santa, photographs are free, and Santa gives each child a wooden toy train to decorate in a craft section at the workshop. \u00a0What a wonderful way to meet Santa!<\/p>\n

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After returning to the main train station on the west side of the RV park, the riders get cocoa, cookies and entertainment. \u00a0There were a traveling petting zoo on hand, and a snack bar\/gift shop area.<\/p>\n

The facilities were well-kept and the holiday decorations were beautiful!<\/p>\n

After the train, we headed over to Foley, AL to a touristy restaurant called Lambert’s Cafe<\/a>. \u00a0They advertise that they’re the “Home of Thrown [sic] Rolls”…and that’s precisely what they do: fling the HUGE yeast rolls across the dining room to customers. \u00a0The boys enjoyed catching them for us! \u00a0Sadly, I tried and tried to get a picture of the young man just as the roll was leaving his hands.<\/p>\n

The menu is “comfort food”, like what you would expect at Cracker Barrel, and the portions were ENORMOUS! \u00a0Dave and I should have share something!<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
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The kid was too fast for me to catch the roll flying through the air.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n\n\n\n\n
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Look at the size of these rolls! \u00a0Still warm, too!<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n\n\n\n\n
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There’s a paper towel with fried okra in front of me. \u00a0Servers came around with “pass arounds” all throughout the meal.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

On Saturday evening, after Christmas Eve church services, we headed to the Gulf Breeze Zoo for the “Zoo Lights” event<\/a>. \u00a0We had a nice time seeing the lights, and even got a sneak peek at many of the animals at night!<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, I left the good camera at home and most of my iPhone pictures were pretty lousy. \u00a0This one was nice, though. \u00a0The kids were being silly in the foreground.<\/p>\n

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We had a fun couple days sightseeing and enjoying some of the local holiday traditions. \u00a0Dave’s finally getting his “travel legs” back after his surgery and on Friday withstood about 4 hours in the car, to and from the Foley, Alabama area. We live about 1 1\/2 hours from the Wales West RV Park…and Tourist […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[1],"tags":[170,233,185,54,59,58,53],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5ycQ0-bf","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1608,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2012\/12\/alabama-discoveries-4-bellingrath-gardens-christmas.html","url_meta":{"origin":697,"position":0},"title":"Alabama Discoveries 4: Bellingrath Gardens Magic Christmas in Lights (Includes Visit Tips)","date":"29 December 12","format":false,"excerpt":"I've been wanting to write about this for a while, but before I knew it, Christmas got a bit overwhelming.\u00a0 Since there are still several days to enjoy the light show, I will try to get this post out there before their last weekend so people can try to fit\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","img":{"alt_text":"DSC_1405","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/12\/DSC_1405-1024x678.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":721,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2012\/03\/uss-alabama-battleship-overnight-adventure-in-mobile.html","url_meta":{"origin":697,"position":1},"title":"Alabama Discoveries 3: USS Alabama Battleship “Overnight Adventure” in Mobile","date":"30 March 12","format":false,"excerpt":"You can get an idea of how BIG the guns are on this ship. This past weekend the boys had the opportunity to camp out on the USS Alabama battleship at its museum location in Mobile Bay. \u00a0This is something the organization does for Scout groups (and other groups) most\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"alabama\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/3.bp.blogspot.com\/-g8fHqkWI2wY\/T3UhRQhgqLI\/AAAAAAABhvE\/AxkG1GLbB9w\/s640\/IMG_2756.JPG?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2260,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2013\/07\/alabama-discoveries-6-bellingrath.html","url_meta":{"origin":697,"position":2},"title":"Alabama Discoveries 6: Bellingrath Gardens for Mother’s Day","date":"04 July 13","format":false,"excerpt":"As always, when asked what I want for Mother's Day, the answer is the same. I want an outing with the family at a\u00a0location\u00a0of MY choosing. It often involves something more feminine. Being in a house full of guys, I usually have to give up the girlier things during the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"alabama\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/DSC_2972.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":955,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2012\/04\/florida-discoveries-21-dolphin-cruising-in-destin.html","url_meta":{"origin":697,"position":3},"title":"Florida Discoveries 21: Dolphin Cruising in Destin","date":"30 April 12","format":false,"excerpt":"I guess it's been a while since I wrote one of these \"Discoveries\" posts, isn't it? It doesn't mean we didn't do anything -- in fact, I'm reminded that I should relabel my USS Alabama, Mardi Gras and Santa Train posts \"Alabama Discoveries\"...we do seem to spend a lot of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"boating\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/IMG_1971-1024x768.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2003,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2013\/04\/alabama-discoveries-4-exploreum-mobile.html","url_meta":{"origin":697,"position":4},"title":"Alabama Discoveries 5: The Gulf Coast Exploreum Science Center, Mobile","date":"09 April 13","format":false,"excerpt":"On the last day of the boys' Spring Break, we took a field trip to Mobile's Gulf Coast Exploreum Science Center. I went in thinking it would be an all-day museum, but we ended up not spending much time there at all. The kids enjoyed it, but there seemed to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"alabama\"","img":{"alt_text":"The Gulf Coast Exploreum is in a primo location in the heart of downtown Mobile. We enjoyed the museum, but it appears to need some updates.","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/04\/DSC_2751-1024x678.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2656,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2013\/10\/colorado-discoveries-15-georgetown-loop.html","url_meta":{"origin":697,"position":5},"title":"Colorado Discoveries 15: The Georgetown Loop Railroad","date":"12 October 13","format":false,"excerpt":"A couple weekends ago our family took a trip up towards Denver to visit the Georgetown Loop Railroad. It was a beautiful early autumn day. I was hoping we'd see brighter aspen, but we were a couple weeks early for that. The Georgetown Loop Railroad is a remnant of the\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/523534_10151708813178865_350151304_n.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/697"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=697"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/697\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":973,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/697\/revisions\/973"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=697"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=697"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=697"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}