The Zoo and Fenway Park

More from our Massachusetts trip:

Day 6: This morning Gram, Adriana, Jason, Amanda, and I went to the zoo. Southwick's Zoo is the largest zoo in New England, and is only 2 miles from my parents' house. My sister, brothers, and I used to ride our bikes there in the summer when we were little kids - back in the days when kids could do such things as ride their bikes 2 miles from home through the back country roads of a small town...
Anyway..... this is a wonderful place to walk around and enjoy all kinds of wild animals up close! The animal enclosures are roomy but not enormous, and it is very easy to see the animals even when they aren't being terribly active! One of the kids' favorite parts is the Deer Forest, which is a fenced in area of woods crisscrossed with walking paths, and home to dozens of deer. Years ago, when the Deer Forest first opened, the deer were very skittish, and wouldn't let people get very close. But now the deer are quite tame, and came right up to us looking for corn. So the kids were able to hand-feed quite a number of them this morning ~ and had deer slobber all over their hands as a result. Yay for Purell!!



That evening Mark, Jason, Amanda and I took the T from Natick into Boston and went to a Red Sox game at Fenway Park! Mark's college roommate, Walt, is chaplain for the team, so he was able to get us tickets! That is apparently quite a feat, since Red Sox home games are sold out events. THANK YOU, WALT! Our seats were between 1st base and the right field foul pole, about 10 rows back from the field - GREAT seats! Jason was in heaven. Now the game could have been better. The Angels pitcher almost had a no-hitter, but the Sox finally scored in the top of the 9th inning, and ended up losing 7-2. We ate hot dogs and peanuts and lemonade - classic ballpark food which costs a small fortune. It was a lot of fun!!!



Day 7: We went to Walt's house for lunch and a swim in his pool. Walter is single - which I can't understand cuz he is a kind, handsome, wonderful Christian man - and has a house in N. Attleboro where he frequently entertains the athletes and families that he works with in his ministry. Right after college, Walt joined the staff of Athletes in Action, a branch of Campus Crusade for Christ, and started off in college ministry with student athletes at Syracuse University. After a few years, he moved to professional sports, and began ministries with the Boston Red Sox and New England Patriots teams. He conducts worship services for the teams, leads Bible studies, disciples individual athletes, offers personal and family counseling, conducts community outreach events with the Christian players, and I'm sure is involved in many other things that I'm not mentioning. He is involved with both the major league team and the farm teams. He doesn't travel to away games very often, but he was with the Red Sox at both their World Series wins in 2004 and 2007, and was given World Series rings along with the team!! That is so cool! He brought them out to show us, and let Amanda and Jason try them on and take pictures. Just to make their friends jealous!! He also traveled to the Super Bowl games with the Patriots. This year he has given over his duties with the Patriots to a former player, and is now beginning a ministry with the Boston Celtics basketball team! Pray for Walt and the athletes he ministers to and with. They have such influence on young people in our culture.


** I've been holding off on posting because I've been trying to get photos loaded on the computer. But I'm having some trouble with that, so I'm posting this and hopefully will be able to add the pictures later.