Doggies, Turtles and Ducks, Oh My!

Audra and I visited the park on campus today to see the ducks and turtles. She is teething and particularly grumpy, so I needed something to do to get out of the house. We have also been trying to teach her the word "duck" (which I'm pretty sure she has said a few times), so I figured it wouldn't hurt for her to see some. When we arrived, a few of the ducks beelined straight to us. I'm assuming they thought we came with food. I felt bad, but I also know that it isn't good for them to eat bread, so it was really for their own good. Audra made me pick her up as soon as they got a few yards away. She was quite apprehensive at first. 

After figuring out we had no food to offer, they wandered back to the water. We headed around the pond to look at some swimming out in the water. There was also a large dog someone had brought that Audra liked to point out.

We ended up on the bridge where, after a few minutes, Audra let me put her down. She liked peering through the bars at them. There was one giant turtle and a bunch of smaller ones under the bridge as well, but with the murky water they were hard to see. 

tiptoes!

We then wandered a ways down to look at the turtle on the log. The ducks decided to join us.

When they realized we weren't throwing food at them, they all swam over to the exit and decided to check us out a little closer. Audra was braver this time. 

Oh poor loner duck.

They had forgotten about us and were pecking at weeds. When they suddenly decided to come closer to Audra, she hurried quickly to me.

On our way out, we saw a few more ducks who Audra was okay with getting pretty close to (I'm mostly holding her hand because she was acting like she wanted to run to the water).