Annabelle and I took a trip to the Fernbank Museum of Natural History while Andy worked. When we rolled up to the museum, there were three large dinosaur sculptures in the plaza. However, Annabelle was more interested in hugging the Celestial & Terrestrial Globes (aka, big rocks).
There were Christmas trees decorated throughout the museum, representing different countries. My favorite was the butterfly tree. The first exhibit we walked through was the Walk Through Time in Georgia. Here we saw more dinosaurs, fossils, timeline of Earth’s creation, and best of all, a giant ground sloth. Kristen met up with us partway through this exhibit.
We walked down the Great Hall to the Giants of Mesozoic where there were 2 large dinosaur skeletons (3 stories high) taking up center stage. There were another 2 hanging from the ceiling.
We decided to take a walk outside to the WildWoods which was a series of bridges and boardwalks. We walked past these beautiful fern and petal pods and headed straight to the Adventure Outpost. The sign suggested the area was for 9-13 year old’s, but I find that hard to believe. The average age of the kids there must’ve been closer to 5. Parts of the Adventure Outpost were closed off due to COVID risk – there was a rope tunnel and winding staircase that otherwise looked like a lot of fun. Annabelle climbed up a 4-level tunnel, walked across a rope bridge, and climbed down the 4-level tunnel several times. There were other kids there going the wrong direction and aggressively taking over, but Annabelle was so patient and great at following directions.
We also walked through the Fernbank Forest which still had a lot of lingering fall colors. We took the shorter loop (0.5 mile) around Huntemann Pond. There were some large stones with a railing that we had to make our way down. Annabelle was proud of the fact that she didn’t need any help. We stopped by the Elephant Rock, which was named because of its appearance… I didn’t see it though, just looked like another one of Annabelle’s “big” rocks. Annabelle was starting to run low on steam here, but just tell her we’re racing and she’ll be leading the pack. In fact, as we were racing, there were a couple times when she told me mid-run to “hang on a second” because “xyz”. Once i stopped, she’d laugh and take-off, which was when I would realize it was all a trick.
After the outdoor adventures, we headed back inside to see the rest of the museum. The Amazing Animals: Built to Survive Exhibit had some interesting videos about animal’s anatomy. Fun fact: I learned the difference between a caribou and a reindeer is that the latter is domesticated. Annabelle loved screen time, though I suspect much of the educational storytelling was lost on her. I sat in a chair and waved a big flag which auto-spun me around to simulate the effort of flight. Annabelle was less than impressed.
Next we stopped at the Star Gallery where the ceiling was lit up like the night sky. This led to the World of Shells Exhibit, which we thought Grandma would really like. Then we took the elevator up to the top floor. We spent some time at NatureQuest (9 and under) and Annabelle got to run around and explore some more. They had two baby alligators as well as two terrapins.
The last major exhibit we walked through was the Fantastic Forces. This seemed to be the more scienc-y portion of the museum and we got to test out a few experiments – air pressure sending up rockets, air keeping balls afloat, melting candle wax volcano, chair that rises as a self-pulley system, tornado effects, and of course, the coin spinning thing. Rather than banking the coins, there were coins set aside for this purpose to which Annabelle sent off again and again and again.
When I asked Annabelle what her favorite part of the day was, she told me the rope bridge and the boardwalk.
We ended the night back at the Airbnb as it was a rather chili day. We grabbed takeout from La Fonda on Ponce de Leon. It was a Mexican/Cuban restaurant and we had seafood paella and bocadillo de chorizo.