Day 222: The ARK!

And the answer to yesterday's clues is this:

The one, the only, Noah's ark! 510 yards in length! 5 stories tall! 50 feet wide! Yes, it truly is that big in real life!  Can't wait to take you inside...tomorrow!  And if you want to take a video tour, be sure to check out their YouTube channel.  It's called The Ark Encounter.  It is part of Ken Ham's ministries and connected with the Creation Museum.  It gives me goosebumps just looking at it again!

More details to come tomorrow....but it rates higher than most historical, if not all, historical places I've been to (ok, it's brand new, BUT, it IS history!)

Here's the rest of the story:

You park in a parking lot a few minutes away and take a shuttle up the hill to the Ark.  I got goosebumps when I saw it.  It was amazing!

Representing PEI today with my PEI shirt and necklace!

The door for the animals.

Largest wooden structure in the world.  There are these huge poles that span from the top to the bottom, all one piece.

The Altar? at the end of the flood, Noah  and his family celebrated with burning a sacrifice.

Justin's favorite thing!  He loved how the waste could be scraped down toward the first floor.. 

The belly of the boat.

Each of the 3 levels contains the family group of 8 in various tasks.  The first part of the tour represents the 40 days and nights of the storm.  Remember, Noah and his family would have not known what rain or a storm was.  Plants were watered by streams and the dew of the earth.  God separated the waters above and below the earth with sky.  So, here the whole family is praying to God because it's incredibly scary!

Can you guess what's in these pots?  Snakes and other creatures!

Half of the animals represented were extinct animals and half are still living today.  The modern Ark does not contain enough cages and animals to represent every living thing that would have been on the Ark.  Also, you have to think about how you define "kind."  If "kind" means 2 canines (wolf, dog, or coyote) or 2 felines (lion or tiger or panther or 2 equines (horses or zebras), etc., then the number needed on the Ark is much less.  I personally believe that animals of a certain "kind" can ADAPT to their environment, just like the 8 humans on Noah's Ark did after the flood.  We don't have red and yellow, black and white, etc. people without some kind of adaptation, i.e. Africans developed dark skin to combat the sun's rays, especially in middle and upper Africa.  (go to Answersingenesis.org for more info).

3 decks, but 5 modern stories tall.  The only natural light coming in is from the top.  There were no windows from the side.  And the Bible doesn't talk about how many windows there actually were.

Remember, the Ark Encounter researchers have taken some artistic license based on their research on how the Ark was set up and what was used, etc.  They are good at explaining why they have chosen a particular set up or animal as well.

A sloth like creature?

Oh wait, that creature is mine at the top of that other human.  Abishai LOVED running up and down the corridors of the Ark!

A very long boat.  The Ark wasn't as big as some of the modern cruise boats of today, but you have to think about how hard it must have been and how long it took to build it all by hand out of only wood.

Abishai wants a snack!

Again, the middle of the boat with it's huge pillars, each pillar being a huge tree trunk!

The sign says it all.

Where there dinosaurs on the Ark?  Yes, it's a big possibility!  There are actually several kinds of dinosaurs represented at the Ark Encounter.  I was so excited when I saw them!  Noah could have brought young dinosaurs (and other animals) that wouldn't have taken up as much space as adults onto the Ark.

A lot of my animal pictures are dark because the lighting was subdued and I don't know my camera settings well.  I also forgot to change them back when I should of.  Thus, this picture is hard to see, but it's a cutaway of the smaller cages and how it could have been set up.  Think of how a hamster or rabbit gets water from their water bottle.

This is Noah in his study.  There are questions you can ask him and he'll answer!

Any history that had been written down, any knowledge of the arts, etc. had to be on the Ark, because the whole earth was destroyed.  So, this Ark showed a ton of it!

Each son was given a trait that their father had, just to even things out.  Here is one of them in the woodworking shop.

Here's the other one in blacksmithing shop.

This is one of my favorite parts of the exhibit.  And here's why:

Exactly.

I've included all the panels for this because I think it's important that we represent the true story of Noah and the Ark and the flood to our kids.  I have plenty of the playful unrealistic books and sets, too.  Time to explain to the kids how it's not accurate! And Noah's Ark is NOT a fairytale!

The one and only door to the Ark! (Well, for fire code there are many, many others of course).

Another view of the middle.  The light is brighter on the 3rd deck.

Walkways that they could water and feed the larger animals.

One of Noah's sons who enjoys history.

One of the son's wives, crafting.  They gave the wives names based on a separate historical document, however, they aren't named in the Bible itself.

A stove!

An area they could relax in while they prepared peas or green beans.  Why all the luxury? Because they had at least 60 years to make everything AND wouldn't YOU want something comfortable if you were going to be somewhere for awhile?  I don't think they knew it was going to be 40 days of rain or almost a year shut into the boat though.

A hanging garden perhaps.

Birds.

Noah sending out the dove!

The third floor has most of the educational exhibits right now.  We were tired by the time we reached there, and since we know the topic well, we decided to skip a few of them.  They had other places on other decks where they are going to keep putting in new exhibits and features as time goes on.  Can't wait!

One exhibit showed the different flood legends from around the world.  Nearly every major tribe or people group has a flood legend.  They showed the different types of watercraft represented by some of them.  This one is from the Epic of Gilgamesh.  (or it's the Borg cube if you're a Star Trek: TNG fan).

Justin was laughing because they showed a cartoonish video of how these other boats weren't designed for a major flood.  In the cube show above, the people and animals were flailing about back and forth and Justin thought it was hilarious!  He's a tween boy, of course it was funny to him.

Currently they have an exhibit with some old Bibles showing the spread of the Gospel to different parts of the world.  They featured a missionary from each area.  This was the oldest one.  Some were from the 1600's or so, but this one was from the 300's!!!

There was lots of space at the two ends of the boat on each deck.  They will probably fill these in at some point or have presentations there or something.  But for now, it's great for little kids to run around in!

The gift shop had tons of Fair Trade items in it.  Fair Trade means that the items were made in poorer countries and that the person who made the item makes their living off of selling them.  But check out this beautiful lion!

They also sold tons of their educational materials and of course the touristy stuff like t-shirts, magnets, ornaments, hats, toys, etc.

"Look, Mom, you need this! It's a Stegosaurus!" Thanks, but I'll just take a picture of it instead of spending money on something that will take up space we don't have.  It was cute though!  They had other dinosaurs too.  We got a tree ornament from Peru instead.

It's barely up right now, but we took a peek at the petting zoo behind the ark.  They have camel and donkey rides, ostriches, kangaroos, goats and mini horses to pet, a zebra (I think, it could have been their zorse), etc.  They also have a petting zoo over at the Creation Museum so they've been moving them around as things are built.  There weren't as many signs explaining things as I had hoped, especially in the petting zoo area.  Maybe that will come with time.  I would have wanted more signs on the animals cages inside as well.  They are finishing up with their 9am to midnight hrs for the first 40 days they've been open.  Yes, we went in the first 40 days!  Then it will be regular museum hours like 9-6 or 10-5 or a different combination of it.  Right now, 5,000 people a day have been coming through.  It's so exciting to finally see it completed!  I've been watching it's progress since they dreamed about it two years ago and I saw a sample of it at the Creation Museum.  BTW, some of the educational material does naturally crossover between the CM and the Ark, but they are too totally different experiences.  In fact, they are 45 minutes apart by car!  You need at least 1 day for each, if not 2.  Oh, but what an important piece to God's story.  I pray that many atheists and Christians who aren't solid in their faith come through the doors of either place and fully commit their lives to Christ because of what they saw.  In fact, they did bring a group of atheists through the Ark Encounter before it opened.  I don't know what they thought of it, but I found that interesting.

That wasn't the end of our day, but, I'll continue the story tomorrow.