In our second blog entry about Discovery Place Science, we finish up the dog exhibit and visit the rainforest room.
There were lots of interesting stations in the dog exhibit. There was a place with a box that you put your head into where you watched a screen and listened to the world as a dog might hear it. Felix did a good job just sitting next to the display while I put my whole head in the box! He also reacted well when pressing buttons to release smells and sounds that dogs experience.
Next up we looked at some historical artifacts of dogs from all over the world. My favorite was a small sculpture of a hairless dog from Mexico. Felix was very good at hanging out while I looked at the art. Then we walked through a simulated neighborhood that highlighted what a dog might be listening to when they were out on a walk. It was a very narrow, twisty turny pathway and only one wheelchair could fit through at a time. Unfortunately they didn’t have an exit or entrance marked, so as I was going through in one direction, a family came by in the other and they had to back out of the exhibit to let me by! Not well designed for wheelchairs!
As we walked around, there were several more dog statues like I described in yesterday’s blog entry. Brad got some pictures of Felix near the dog statues, and he did so well! He also used a blue light to get some really cute and funny pictures of Felix with his tongue out!
They had a display where you could put your head through a hole in the wall on top of a picture of a dog so that it looked like your head replaced the dog’s head. Well of course I stuck Felix in that hole so his head and legs were on top of a lab’s body LOL!
All along one wall of the exhibit they had a long raceway for kids to run and see how fast they could go. This was then compared to how fast dogs of different breeds can run. A bell would ring to signal the start of the kids’ running time, and then the kids would run full speed down the roped-off trackway. It was very exciting and distracting! So of course we spent some time hanging out watching. We got a video and several pictures. The neon drawn on one of the pictures is from Brad being silly with the editing, but Felix is lit in magenta in other pictures from Brad’s light.
As the exhibit wrapped up, we saw a dog and human skeleton and took a picture in front of GIANT pictures of dogs along the walls. It made Felix look extra small LOL!
When we left the dog exhibit, there was a piece of paper on the floor that we walked past. Felix did such a good job with his leave-it that I had to get a video! We walked past the piece of paper twice during the video, and Felix only needed a gentle reminder to leave-it on the second pass.
Lastly for this blog entry, we entered into the rainforest room. I was later informed that service dogs are not allowed in this area, so oops on that. We didn’t see a sign when we went in (though we may have accidentally gone into the exit instead of the entrance).
The rainforest room is a two-story room with a waterfall and small river and lots of tropical plants. They also have rainforest birds flying free! They made really interesting noises. They have a rope bridge, which we did not cross in our wheelchairs!
When we first entered the room, Felix was very confused about where we were and what was happening. So many new smells and sounds! So we got a video of him looking around a bit near the rope bridge. One bird calls during the video. This video is just to show how he acted at the start of the room. There’s a better video later on 🙂
As we hung out in the room, Brad got some pictures of Felix acclimating. He heeled nicely down the path, and worked up the courage to get close to the railing to look over into the waterfall and river below. He also got used to the intermittent heavy misting.
After a few minutes in the room, Felix was much more comfortable. We got a video of him sitting next to my wheelchair as a parrot says “Hello!” and another bird calls loudly. He just looks around and maintains his sit as this happens. This is the best video from today’s blog entry!
Shortly after that video was taken, a staff member came in to tell us service dogs aren’t allowed in the rainforest room, so we left right away.
In tomorrow’s blog entry, we’ll continue on our journey around the museum and visit the aquarium! Stay tuned!