July 7-8th, 2009 – Alien Fresh Jerky & Legoland

July 7th – Alien Fresh Jerky

So, we have traveled  through Baker, CA so many times, it’s not funny.  We’ve all seen the signs advertising the “Alien Fresh Jerky.”  Well, this time we decided to stop on a whim.  It is your classic tourist trap, but did give us a chance to stretch our legs, and take photos.

The jerky is made locally in Baker, so they package it up and it’s sold so fast and in vast quantity that it’s fresh.  Lots of different people from all over usually fill up the place just to try their multi-flavor jerky they have to offer.  They have 6 free samples out at a time which is nice, so that you can try some of the different flavors they have.  The jerky’s not cheap… $8.00 for 4 oz, or if you buy 3 bags, you can save $4 and get 3 for $20.  We got the Honey Teriyaki and Carne Asada.  We all really liked the honey teriyaki..sweet and marinated, while I found the carne asada kinda dry.

Aside from the jerky, they have cool little containers of candy,  a fortune teller located inside the shop, bottles of chili with hilarious facts/quotes as ads, and  tons of t-shirts.  Outside, an alien crashed his car in front of the shop, and there’s a landed spaceship waiting to take the aliens away.  More pictures from Alien Fresh Jerky!

July 8th – Legoland

We went to Legoland on my birthday, not deliberately, it’s just how it worked out with vacation and travel times.  Cole has been begging to go to Legoland for a long time, so we finally gave in.  It wasn’t a place Scott or I was super thrilled to go too again, since it’s mainly themed for ages 3-12.  We made the best of it though, and Cole had a fun time.

We signed Brittany up in the beginning of the day for MindStorms on a recommendation from Scott’s aunt. MindStorms is where you can build and program computerized robots that obey your every command.  She had a lot of fun with that, and I’m glad we did that.  Cole had fun riding all the rides he could, and Scott and I had fun checking out the new areas that were added since the last time we were there. A waterpark was getting ready to be opened, but was not ready when we went.

We purchased a park hopper pass that included the Sea Life Aquarium next door, since that was something that was new to us as well.  My favorite part of Legoland is the Miniland USA, which includes reproductions of seven areas of the United States, all constructed with 20 million LEGO bricks in 1:20 scale.  A new area to us was the Las Vegas Strip, where they constructed 10 different hotel properties.  They even had interactive features of the exploding volcano outside Mirage, fireboats spraying water for New York, New York, and working rides on the Stratosphere.

One of the kids’ favorite things to do was any of the driving rides, like the Skipper School, where you got to drive boats, or the Volvo Driving School, where you got to drive cars.  On the boats, Scott and I were in for a hilarious ride as the two kids tried to drive us around obstacles in the water, and we are both thankful that they won’t be getting licenses anytime soon.  They did better at the car driving school, as Cole seemed to really try to concentrate on going the right way, so he could earn his license!

Another fun thing we did as a family was the Fun Time Fire Academy.  You had to race LEGO fire trucks across a straightaway, then you had to pump water through a hose and then aim the water to put out a “burning” building, and then race back (all hand pumping) across the straightaway.  It was a hilarious workout as Scott and I did all the pumping, while the kids had to aim water at the “fire” through all the laughter.  Somehow, we managed to be the family that won out of the 4 firetrucks.

It was a long day at the park, but we all had a fun time.  To see pictures from our Legoland trip, click here!