On Wednesday of this past week, I was reading the local newspaper and noticed an ad for $2 admission to Natural Bridge! Upon checking into this further, I found that they were having a food collection drive for a food bank in the region and admission was in fact $2 per person for Virginia residents who brought a non-perishable food item Thursday through Sunday. We decided this was a great opportunity for a family day at a very reasonable price. For those of you who have not looked into tickets, I have not seen them for less than $20 each, other than this.
Brent has the day off on Fridays, So, Friday morning, we loaded the girls and our gear and our four cans of food. We actually got to the Natural Bridge and found out the girls are still young enough that only Brent and I required a ticket.
We began in the wax museum. This was an interesting experience trying to explain to Rachel that these life like people that she sees are not real. The explanation that they are alot like "Play-dough people" seemed to work best. Then she wanted to know if their clothes and hair are Play-dough too! We did get a couple of pictures. You may notice in Rachel's that she was not getting too close and I had to be in the picture. She was willing to take a picture with me and the wax figure but not by herself!
Next we headed to the indoor butterfly garden. We were told as we went in that you could not touch the butterflies. Rachel was a little disappointed since she wanted to hold a butterfly. The staff member did try to catch one so Rachel could see one up close but before she could, a butterfly found Rachel's bow. Rachel was thrilled and we did get a few pictures before the butterfly headed off to a new spot.
After the butterfly garden, we headed next door to the toy museum. Rebekah was very interested in this particular group of dolls. I showed them to her at least 3 times and every time she pointed to the same spot. I did notice in the toy museum that there were several toys that I remember being on the shelves when I was younger...
Rachel, of course, was willing to have her picture made with the ballerina doll.
What trip to Natural Bridge would be complete without pictures with the giant bear to show how tall you are on this trip to the Bridge. I will tell you it took 4-5 tries to get Rebekah to sit still in front of the bear. I would sit her down and by the time I moved enough for Brent to take the picture she would have crawled the other direction out of the picture. Actually, we finally got her to sit in front of the bear long enough to take this shot by putting her behind the bear and letting her crawl underneath him. She then sat up and Brent managed to get this picture before she crawled off again!
By the point, it was lunchtime and everyone was definitely hungry. We decided that we would take the shuttle and finish by seeing the bridge after lunch. We headed to the nearby Pink Cadillac Restaurant. Yes, they do have a pink Cadillac in the front yard and no, I did not get a picture because it started POURING rain just after we got to the restaurant. We were certainly glad we were not still outside at Natural Bridge at this point! We all enjoyed lunch. Rebekah did wake up to eat and Rachel spent a good portion of lunch "playing" the jukebox as you see here:
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| Catching a little rest while waiting for the shuttle. Can you tell it was getting close to nap time? |
We did ride the shuttle down to the bridge since we had the wide double stroller that would not have worked too well with the 137 steps you have to walk if not taking the shuttle. I am sure Rachel could have done it, she is becoming quite the hiker. Maybe we will get a chance to try the hike down another time.
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| The girls and I at the Bridge |
Further down the trail after you go under the Natural Bridge, there is a replica of a Native American village of the Monacan tribe. The girls saw how corn cakes would have been made. Rachel got to hold bear teeth and she was actually given a corn husk doll at one of the stations. Both girls also enjoyed trying out the ati, which is this little "cottage" in the pictures below.
Our tickets also included admission to Natural Bridge Caverns. So that was our last stop before heading home for the girls' naps. We saw a little black snake as we were headed down the walkway into the Caverns. According to Rachel, the Caverns were her favorite part. Here is Rachel with a few of the formations. We enjoyed learning about the differences between stalactites and stalagmites too.
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| Our family at Natural Bridge, September 28, 2012 |
We enjoyed our family day and the opportunity to experience this place together. It is a good reminder for me to look up at this enormous bridge of rock and be reminded that we serve a God that created this and is so much more immense and vast than this giant rock. This rock that looks so big to me looks tiny to Him. Yet, as small as we are, He loves us, desires to save us and so sent His Son to die for us so that we could be forgiven of all we have done wrong through Jesus' death on our behalf!
It reminds of me a familiar hymn:
" Rock of Ages, cleft for me,
let me hide myself in thee;
let the water and the blood,
from thy wounded side which flowed,
be of sin the double cure;
save from wrath and make me pure. "
-Augustus M. Toplady
He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the
miry clay,
And He set my feet upon a rock making my footsteps firm.
Psalm 40:2
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