Landmark Park

On Tuesday Andy and Aaron had the day off (it actually is a rarity), so we went to Landmark Park in Dothan. It is supposed to depict life in the 1890's, there is a general store, church and other various buildings in addition to a barn with animals and a playground. So we trekked off there Tuesday morning. We drove up to the park ranger station and paid our entrance fee. She asked if we would like a map and we said sure, and then she directed us to the parking lot. As Andy was driving off, I was looking through the papers she handed us and there was only one map. With directions on how to get to Landmark park. Now if we made it to the ranger station certainly we wouldn't need a map to get there. Hm..we were thinking it was a map of the park. Oh well. We got out and noticed the store didn't open for another 30 minutes so we wandered around. The first building was an one room school house. We were able to look from the door but didn't get to do much there. I noticed a large placard outside and thought perhaps it would have information about the school house but it just stated when and who donated it to the park. O.k. Then we went into the church. Very nice little building and we could walk around in it. Aaron noticed the pulpit and had to try it out.

First a happy sermon:

Then a serious one:

Kara also wanted her picture taken behind the pulpit, but we just couldn't see her at all. It was neat that they both wanted to try it out though. Perhaps there is a bit of Great-Grandpa Hartmann in them.

After that Aaron led us to the boardwalk. He was leading us since he had been there last year with his Kindergarten class. Along the way there were little huts that had some of the wildlife depicted. There was actually information on the placards in the huts but Aaron did not let us stop long enough to read them. Kara did like the fish that were swimming in the "pool" (which was actually a pond but she didn't believe us). And we saw a few huge spiders. Yuck.

Here is daddy and the kids on the board walk.

Next there was the park office and it had tons of displays about a cowboy from Dothan, Johnny Mac Brown. He was apparently very big in the silent movies. Interesting. There was also a tiny display about why the wiregrass was called the wiregrass. That may have been neat too but the kids decided it was time to move on so I will just have to read that one next time.

Then we went to the barns to see the animals. They were feeding them right as we walked up to it so we got to talk to the lady that feeds the animals. She was telling us the names of the animals. She informed us the sheep didn't have names because they were not friendly. So Andy made the sheep noise to see there response.



Yes, they stopped what they were doing and stared right at him. It was strange. After a while the other two stopped staring but the one on the end kept his eye on Andy.

After that the general store was open so we went to check that out. The man there was a little strange because he kept saying how are you ladies doing to me and AARON? We didn't stay there long. Finally we went to the playground and the kids had fun.

It was a nice time and we will probably go back to read what we missed the first time. It would have been even more interesting if they had placards up to explain everything but oh well. At least the trees were pretty.

The best part however was Aaron and Kara saying there favorite part. They both liked the sheep staring at daddy. Kara even did a re enactment of it. It is hilarious. She is still doing the sheep face and it cracks us up!

Here's a movie of it.: