Lazy 5 Ranch

A friend sent me a link about educators receiving free admission to Lazy 5 Ranch this weekend. Our family has such a great time at Zootastic's Teacher Appreciation Day, and I've been wanting to check out Lazy 5, so this was a great opportunity. Since children under 2 receive free admission, we shamelessly lied about the trio's age. We only had to pay the $11 admission for Jackson. If we had paid for all six of us it would have cost $76!

At Lazy 5 you can ride through the ranch in your own vehicle or get out and take a wagon ride. Since the trio's windows don't even roll down, we definitely wanted to take the wagon. We had a little over an hour before the next wagon ride. We strolled around the fields.

All of the kids were surprisingly receptive and willing to be near the animals.

James was especially intrigued by his close view of the animals.

Jesse insists that I'm becoming Clark Griswold from Vacation in my "quest for fun" this summer. It was a running joke all day for Jesse to pull up movie clips on his phone that proved our similarities. I may or may not have brought some rancid ham for our picnic lunch. Jesse made me watch the scene where the Griswold's ate sandwiches that their dog had urinated on.

After lunch the kids explored the impressive pirate ship playground. While it was very cool, it was a bit harder for the toddlers to navigate independently.

Maddie preferred the swing and threw quite a tantrum when I took her out of it.

An hour was a perfect amount of time to eat, play, and walk around before the wagon ride. The wagon was pulled by mules (or horses? Jesse and I are unsure.) There was more than enough feed included in the wagon ride--a full bucket for every two people.

I scored a front corner seat, which I thought would provide more stability for James and I. Unfortunately our view came with quite the aroma.

I was also stung/bitten by horseflies all over my legs, feet, and hands. The flies were really distracting! I guess that explains why the wagon driver wore long sleeve shirts, pants, gloves, and boots, despite the summer heat.

Most animals could be fed directly from your hands. The driver made at least a dozen stops so the animals could approach the wagon for us to feed.

Everyone fed the animals. Maddie mostly dropped dropped the feed off the side of the wagon. She and James had a hard time reaching the animals from our laps. Amelia and Jackson had more range of motion and could drop the food in the animals' mouths.

Since I was holding James and taking pictures, I didn't get any photos of James feeding or touching the animals. He was more interested in throwing food inside the wagon than feeding the animals anyways.

The wagon ride was a very long and hot hour and a half ride. The trio's energy levels dropped rapidly after an hour. While it's really cool to drive through wildlife habitats, it was odd to sit in traffic with other wagons, personal vehicles, and large herds of cattle, deer, zebras, emus, etc. There were no meltdowns, but we were all ready to get off the wagon before the ride ended.

I don't think the experience was worth $76, but it was well worth the $11 we spent. We had a lot of fun eating, playing, and getting unique close-up views of animals.