Menu

Safari Park Day Off

Published July 13, 2019
Brick in Day Off mode: you know your mules are ready for a day off when your pack mule hides behind a tree…

A bag of corn, a bucket of water and a salt block. Oh, and a herd of elk. The mules are chillin’ on their day off. We’re guests of the Lee G Simmons Conservation Park and Wildlife Safari.

The mules’ arrival at the Wildlife Safari Park.

The Lee G Simmons Conservation Park and Wildlife Safari features a collection of animals indigenous to the Nebraska Plains. From elk, bison and prairie dogs to owls and a tiger salamander, it’s home to a deep collection of Nebraska’s prairie life. The safari part of it is that you get to drive through it all in your car.

The park has close ties with the Omaha Zoo, one of the nation’s top zoos. In addition to the drive-through Great Plains safari, the park has a successful cheetah breeding program. A tiger breeding program is also being developed.

The park hosted mules Brick and Cracker on site behind the interns house. While they munched and sipped and rested, the park gave me a great tour of their drive-through exhibit.

This is Christine DuPre’. She’s the person that got it all organized for me. We met in Plattsmouth, Nebraska 2 days ago. She works with primates at the Omaha Zoo. She thought I’d enjoy visiting the Wildlife Safari Park with my mules and, voilà, here we are. Thanks Christine!
The mule chow Trinity: water, corn and salt. All provided by the Wildlife Safari Park.
Home tonight: my tent under the old pear tree.

A Tour of the Safari Park

I thought you’d enjoy a few pics from my tour of the park. Driving through the drive-through safari was a great preview of the animals and fauna that lie ahead of me as the mules and I travel West.

Rich has been with the park 17 years. Because I couldn’t ride the mules on the safari, he drove me through the park in his vehicle. Rich often serves as tour guide on bus loads of visitors so it was real honor to get the one-on-one tour.
Elk cooling off in a pond. The bulls’ antlers are in velvet stage. In another month or so, the soft covering will peel off to reveal the hard antlers.
Whooping crane. that’s not green scum, that’s duckweed, a tiny flowing plant.

Bison-sized Thanks

It’s been surreal showing up in Nebraska 2 days ago, not knowing anyone, and having this beautiful experience appear.

For that, I want to extend thanks to:

  • Christine DuPre’ (Omaha Zoo)
  • Dan Cassidy (Omaha Zoo)
  • Gary Pettit: Wildlife Safari Park Superintendent
  • Rich: for the personal tour of the park. Rich declined a ride on my pack saddle so we used his personal vehicle to tour the park.
  • Everyone else at the Wildlife Safari Park who made it such a great stay for us (and magically made corn and salt appear in front of my mules)
  • Kim and Mike
Kim and Mike: yesterday I called the Safari Park. Kim answered the phone. I explained I was looking for a place to stay with my mules. Odd as the request was, Kim didn’t hang up on me. Here, she and Mike are fueling me with Safari Park pop corn and coffee so I can get this post up.

From the Safari Park (outside Ashland, Nebraska) the mules and I head toward Valparaiso, Nebraska. From there we’ll follow the sun west.

Cracker spending some quality time with his salt brick. The mules are sweating a lot in the heat so salt is as important as water these days.

Links:

http://www.wildlifesafaripark.com/

Other posts you might enjoy:

Posted in Latest News, Mules West, Travel by Mule

6 Responses to Safari Park Day Off

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Find…
Current Ramble
Modes of Travel
Other Cool Reads
Categories
Archives
Follow Bernie!
Newsletter General Store Too Proud to Ride a Cow Woody and Maggie 65 Days at Sea

Designed by Christian Harberts.