Fall Festivals

Northern Virginia

It's that time of year again for pumpkins, hay rides and apple cider! Have I mentioned before that my favorite apple cider is Rinker's apple cider? This is the only time of year that I can get my hands on some good cider from Rinker's! =) Fortunately, Great Country Farms in Bluemont carries them! (Yes, the photo above is not Great Country Farms, it's Pumpkin Village formerly know as Pumpkinville in Leesburg!)


 
Here's some of the fun things to do at Pumpkin Village! I love the hill slides and all the bounce houses there! They do have hayrides too! One for everybody and one just for the little ones!


 
Pumpkin Village is located right next to the Leesburg Animal Park, so on your visit to the village, you'll get to visit the animal park too! Beware when feeding the llamas there! One llama actually followed us around! Ah, and be very careful when feeding the camels, hold on to your feeding cup very well, they're very feisty and will try to grab the feeding cup from your hands! I'm speaking from personal experience! Haha!


Another fun place to visit is Great Country Farms, not just because they sell Rinker's apple cider, but they have lots of fun stuff for fall too! You can go apple picking or pumpkin picking, or just have fun on their hill slides and various play structures!


 
The time we visited, they had the "Oinkintucky Derby"! That was quite a fun race to watch! Like I mentioned before, there's lots of other things to do here. Don't you just love fall with the beautiful colors, the crisp air, the apple cider and all these fun places to visit! =)

Riverbend Park

Great Falls, VA

 
It was a nice day to take a walk along a trail at Riverbend Park. That's the Potomac River in the photo. Of course, the other side of the river is Maryland! Can you see some paddlers on the river? Looks like a really nice paddle on that stretch of the Potomac!


 
Here's a few more photos along the trail. There's some part on the trail that we took that's uphill. Beautiful trail still!


 
We were looking for a place to sit down and have a snack when we saw the wide green open space you see in the picture. We had a big laugh when we reached it, it was a pond! Haha! I've never seen a pond before all covered in green! There's a first for everything, I guess! So, we had to settle eating our snack somewhere on the side of the trail. I think there are some other trails here at Riverbend park, I wouldn't mind exploring them next time!

Some animal fun at the Reston Zoo!

 
I really thought when I first saw this exhibit that they were meerkats... On closer inspection, they look more like rats! Hee-hee! So, I had to check the sign to find out what are they? They stand very much like meerkats, without the eye bags. They're actually prairie dogs! What do you know, I think this is the first time I saw prairie dogs!


 
A visit to Reston Zoo is not complete without visiting the feeding barn! Look at those hungry, hungry goats! =D


 
I think this was the first time I saw the white peacock there showing off his tail! It was funny too, because his lady friend was a chicken and not a peahen! Hee-hee! Of course, I also just wanted to show you one of the types of monkeys that they have there.


 
Here's some of the budgies in their aviary. Some of them are very feisty that a lot of kids get scared of them when they land on a feeding stick and try to shoo away other birds! Some of the kids actually just dropped their feeding stick! Feisty or not, their colors are beautiful!


 
I wanted to show some more of the animals here. Here's a coati, and some lemurs. Aren't the lemurs so cute huddled together? And some ducks. I know, you see ducks everywhere, I just took a picture and thought why not show it? =D


 
The kangaroos here is one of my favorites! Unfortunately, they changed the fencing used inside so now you won't be able to see them hop about the path you're walking on! The next photo is some sort of fowl that was just wandering around there, so I don't really know what it's called. Haha! The last picture looks like just bars, but if you look closer, there's a leopard there, I forgot what type though. =D


 
Here's a photo of one of the ponies there! They used to have pony rides there, but they have now retired the ponies and put up a carousel there. You can see the ponies when you take the wagon ride! They have some alligators too!


 
They have a small lake there where you can rent paddle boats (or is it pedal boats?). Here's a cute piggy! Of course, they have signs there do not hand feed the pigs, they bite. So, not so cute after all. Hee-hee! They do have llamas there too! (Alpacas too when you take a wagon ride!)


 
The wagon ride here is pretty nice. Although, you used to be able to feed the animals there, but now no feeding is allowed. Still pretty cool though! Here's one of my favorite cows there, Dr. Pepper, a watusi cow! Look at how big his horns are! Can you see the unicorn? Hee-hee! I know, it's not! It's an eland with just one horn! Sure looks like unicorn, right? =)


 
Some other animals that you'll find there is some foxes, owls and different types of monkeys! They do have zebras, camels, ostriches, emus, rhea birds and more animals to see! That's all for now!