August 12, 2019
Shortsville, NY
Canandiagua/Rochester KOA Holiday Campground
Site 21
Day 11 started a bit slowly, as we knew we had to be in Rochester (roughly 40 min drive) by 10am, but were still feeling the effects of yesterday's drive. I will say that for the less than 12 hours we spent in this campground, it is quite nice.
Jordan and I took a quick peek after dropping off some trash & recycling, and if you are into KOA-style camping, this place seems legit. We have found that if you are just looking for a place to stop for the night if you're really packing in the miles, these work very well.
Jordan had made a 'Top 5 things Jordan wants to do on this trip' list before we left, and we had 2 remaining to check off. Zoo, and kids museum. It just so happened that Rochester had both.
We had just come from spending 4 days in Acadia, which I believe either sets or ties the record for most consecutive nights in one location on any trip we've ever taken. Of course, the first exhibit we come across? Climbing on rocks and logs.
Whoever put this together deserves a lot of credit. They used real rocks, real logs, and set them up in such a way that it feels very natural while giving the kids tons of different areas to play and challenge themselves. Jordan attempted the rope crossing, which she would ultimately conquer before we left.
We have visited quite a few zoos over the years, and the question is almost always the same. "Do they have Red Pandas?" If yes, nonstop screaming. If no, sad face. In this case, nonstop screaming.
This zoo has an interesting layout, as it follows the river and is on a relatively narrow
tract of land.
I won't bore you with all of the exhibits, but the elephant exhibit was incredible because we got to watch the washing process. Since Jordan ultimately wants to be a zookeeper when she grows up, it was cool to get a behind the scenes look. It also helped us realize how closely the trainers work with these animals. The elephant trainer had a series of hand signals, verbal commands, and treats that resulted in this giant elephant lifting her feet, rolling over, stretching, and presenting each body part to be hosed down like a giant car wash.
The rest of our time here was very well spent, with the only disappointment being that the polar bear was nowhere to be seen. All told we spent about 2.5 hours here and saw pretty much everything we wanted to.
The surroundings of Seneca Park really lend to the atmosphere of the zoo as well.
From here it was about a 20 minute drive to the
Strong National Museum of Play. I won't call it a kids museum, because I may have enjoyed it as much if not more than most of the kids.
There were all sorts of quotes from famously influential people that basically helped me to justify my lack of maturity. The place is huge, and the very first thing we ran into was a tribute to 50 years of Sesame Street.
It was fun to try to explain that this was a kids show that was only on one channel, only at certain times, and that you couldn't just fire it up on the iPad or Kindle whenever you wanted. They had a loop of famous scenes and celebrity cameos throughout the years, and it really brought back some memories. Don't even get me started on the
Big Bird Mr. Hooper episode, I'll be bawling for a week.
For the next few hours, it was a frantic pace of "Check this out!" and "C'mon, look over here!". The
WildKratts exhibit,
Comic book heros...
They also had a butterfly exhibit - we have been going to the one at
Frederik Meijer Gardens for years, but this one added a Fairy door scavenger hunt. I'd be lying if I said we didn't stay an extra 10 minutes just to find that pesky door with the 3 mushrooms.
We were running out of time, but we found the pinball arcade next.
Growing up, we had a pinball machine in our basement that got abused for years. It was fun remeniscing for a bit, and trying to explain to Jordan why anyone would have thought these things were fun.
This next part I really wish my Dad was around to see. We grew up with a Vic 20 with cassette tape drive, a Commodore 64 with the gigantic 5.25 floppy drive (you remember the noise it made), followed by any number of gaming consoles and nerdy electronics. They were all here.
Then we got to the crown jewel, an actual functioning arcade with period correct games that actually took tokens and worked! Kimberly and I got after it - QBert, DigDug, Tron, Street Fighter, Zaxxon, Centipede, Donkey Kong - it was a time machine. Hard to imagine a time when it was ok to drop your kids off at the arcade for several hours while you went about your business. If I could move into this place, I would.
We were running out of time, so we hit the remaining exhibits we could get to and kept finding gold from the past.
(I am positive Kimberly must have had this one growing up. The only thing missing is some sweet 80s shoulder pads in that blazer).
Then I came across this - the coveted Golden Machines 6 pack that my brothers and I fought over for years.
I'll stop here as I could go on forever, but this helped me to understand how much of a lasting impression things like this had made on me, and how those memories of playing as a kid never really leave. It really helped drive home the point that was on the wall somewhere in this place.
- “We don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.” -George Bernard Shaw
This was a day very well spent, and by the time we made it back to the campground, it was clear that it was a fitting way to close out this trip.
Tomorrow - home.
