We went to Branson to visit Abby’s Mimi and Papa about a month ago. We’ve been to Branson many times because Gina’s parents live there, but we hardly ever do any Bransony type stuff. We made a mini-vacation out of this trip so we thought it would be appropriate to bite the Branson fruit and let the nectar run down our faces. Gina’s mom works at a big resort and she got us a very nice suite to stay in. The place has several swimming pools so Abby was pretty happy about that. A huge draw in Branson is the World’s Largest Banjo. As you can see in the picture the neck goes all the way out the window.
Branson is apparently home to half the world’s miniature-golf courses. We picked out the one with a South American expedition theme. Think Indiana Jones or Treasure of the Sierra Madre. Unfortunately, it was about 300 degrees with 85 percent humidity even though it was nearly dark when we got there. We narrowly averted heat prostration, but it did add to the jungle vibe.
We also checked out a pretty neat butterfly emporium filled with tame butterflies.
Fun with signs.
Papa and Abby.
The whole gang minus me.
Of course we had to go to Silver Dollar City. Abby spent a lot of time asking when we were going to eat cotton candy, so we eventually got a huge bucket of the stuff.
The river rafting ride soaked all of us and terrified Abby. I shot this through one of the plastic bags they sell for 50 cents so passengers can protect their cameras and other water-soluble items.
Abby’s favorite place was the giant cage filled with these foam balls. All kinds of weird Rube Goldberg contraptions ferried the balls to the top of the three-story cage where they then got distributed to big containers scattered around. The containers sat near big air guns you used to shoot the balls across the cage or at other people. The whole thing was laid out so that it was nearly impossible to hit others with the air guns. A marvel of engineering. Abby really enjoyed shoving the balls into the big vacuum tubes on the ground level.
Abby wanted to do some less scary rides so we went to the kiddie-ride section, where she refused to ride anything because she thought they would be too scary. Then we went to another section that had baby rides. And I mean actual babies rode these rides alone and had a ball. Not Abby. She screamed bloody murder the entire time on the frog ride, even though Gina was holding on to her. Look at the terror on her face.
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She must have had a great time because she is still talking about this trip. I like the one of her and Papa. I think in the last picture she might be having a flashback from when i took er on that scary airplane ride at the fair. Hope she’s not scarred for life.
What? No ol’ time photo where you dress as a gamber, the wife as a bar maid and the kid as Davy Crockett? I have at least two of these Tintype photos from previous Branson trips.
As a matter a fact, the last time I was at Silver Dollar City (circa 1982) the only ride was “Fire in The Hole!” My how times have changed.