The Living Planet & Snowbird

The final leg of our adventure left us exhausted, but we had a great time. After lunch we went to the Living Planet Aquarium. The girls loved the hands on features, touching the sting rays, star fish, sea urchins, etc. and they thought the shark tank was pretty impressive, but oddly, their favorite thing to see was the "TOADS...LIKE AUNT TOAD!" (Greg's sister's nickname is Toady).
I enjoyed the exact opposite things from Rachel...for example the I find jelly fish fascinating, but Rachel cowered into my shoulder at the very sight. I didn't really care too much for the "boat" they stuck next to the marsh (although the marsh itself was fairly impressive), but it took some serious coaxing to get her out.
I asked Rachel if she wanted to pet, or even just put her hand in the water and "wave" to the sting rays, and put my hand in the water to demonstrate, only to have the ray come a good six inches out of the water to wave "hello" with one of its wings, which REALLY didn't endear them to Rachel, who started to freak out that it was coming to "get her."
But even she liked to see the star fish and the other fish & sharks that were behind glass, so I would consider the outing a success.

When we finished at the aquarium, we decided to get the girls a Slurpee and head up Little Cottonwood Canyon to ride on the tram. I can't tell you how pleased I was that we decided to make the 7-11 pit stop first because as we were heading up the mountain we ran into the "Tour of Utah" bike race and we crawled up the mountain averaging less than 10 miles per hour. It was kind of fun to watch the cyclists creeping up the mountain and to see all of the supporters cheering them on, but we were also pretty excited to finally reach the ski resort, too.
We didn't realize it, but we happened to arrive at Snowbird during Oktoberfest, so we also were able to enjoy a little German entertainment (without the beer) which meant watching the kids who were strapped into harnesses & bungee cords jumping on trampolines (maybe that's what Grandpa Steve should do with his trampoline).

Riding up on the tram was a lot of fun, too. The girls couldn't believe how high up we went & they enjoyed getting out at the top and looking around. The protective mother in me wouldn't let them go for any great hikes at the top, but they still enjoyed sitting at the various viewpoints to look over the valleys.

On the way home, we sang songs to keep the girls entertained, including the song "The Cannibal King with a Big Nose Ring" which Ellie decided to sing on her own. Her lyrics were as follows:
"The Smelly old King with a big nose thing fell in love with a dirty maid. Baroom, Cha Cha!"