Monday, February 26, 2007

Fossil Rim

Fossil Rim Wildlife Center (www.fossilrim.org) is a popular wildlife sanctuary in Glen Rose, a small town about 75 miles (120 kilometers) southwest of Dallas. Its 1800 acres have been divided into large pastures and several special management areas keeping thousands of exotic, threatened and endangered animals from different parts of the world. They roam freely in these areas and a scenic wildlife drive in our own car through these pastures lets us interact with them closely.

We started the trip from Dallas at noon and the 1 hour 20 minutes long drive showed us the beautiful country side of Texas.



Long stretches of roads that meets the horizon,



picturesque cottages,



and huge farm houses were surely sights worth the long drive.

After buying the tickets and a pack of animal food, we started the drive through the sanctuary.



The expansive pastures were filled with animals of all kinds. There were lots of varieties of deer, and the brochure explained them as Fallow Deer from Europe, Axis Deer from India, Gemsbok from Africa, Oryx from Arabia, etc.



The animals appeared very friendly and calm and didn’t bother about the vehicles passing through their haven continuously.



In fact most of them approached the cars, some even posing for the photos



and some looking for the food.


Some dared to peep inside the car to get a better bite, forgetting about their long and spread horns.




We were told not to get out of the car. Though I had a plan to get out, it was never required as all animals were easily accessible from the car itself for taking photos.



Another instruction was not to feed the animals from hand. But nobody seemed to go with this rule. Where else you get a chance to pat and feed animals like giraffe and zebra who roams freely?


It took more than three hours to complete the drive and in between we shopped from the gift store and had lunch from the Overlook Café on a small hilltop providing panoramic view of the sanctuary.

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