Fantastic trip to the zoo

I had to share what an awesome time we had at the zoo yesterday. All morning Piper marched around the house telling us "I want zoo" and Cricket would periodically look up and say "amnals (animals), mama, amnals". They got their point across loud and clear, so DH and I agreed we'd go to the zoo even though it was 38 degrees out. Fortunately, it's usually sunny here even if it is cold, so the weather was pretty good.

Anyway, the trip was great for two reasons. First, there was no one at the zoo. We saw five people total during our entire trip! It was like they opened the entire zoo just for us. Second, all of the animals were out and active. The polar bears were lounging on their big rocks right by the viewing platform, so we spent 20 minutes roaring at them and watching them stick out their tongues. Then on to the lions, who were sunning on their big rocks and in full view. The girls roared and just as we were leaving, the male lion roared back. Pretty impressive. Then we saw the mountain lions, who were only five feet away and separated from us by wires. That was super cool and the girls laughed and pointed as the mountain lions batted around balls. Finally, we saw the elephants, giraffes and zebras, all of whom were out and walking around. I've never seen so many animals at the zoo this close up, nor ever been able to walk up to every exhibit without waiting for someone else to get out of the way. The girls stayed in the stroller most of the time, and every time we'd see a new animal, they'd yell each other's name and say "look! look!". They could not concentrate on the animals until they were each certain that their sister was looking too.

The girls chatted about the animals all the way home and fell asleep the instant we put them to bed last night, so all in all, it was a really successful day.

Anyone else have a great weekend you want to share?

 

That sounds like a fantastic day! Glad you had so much fun!

We've taken ours to the zoo, but I can't wait for them to actually want to go and have fun looking at the animals!

 

That is great!

 

Oh, I'm jealous. That sounds like so much fun. The closest zoo to us is about three hours away, so no "spontaneous" trips to the zoo for us.

Glad you had a great time!

 

Oh, so sweet!! I am jealous-- our zoo trips in recent months have been quite disastrous.

 

And the trips to the zoo just gets better and better as they get older. We have a pass and go at least once a week when the weather is even close to ok. Mine are almost 5 now. They now alot of the animals by name. They can do things like tell the elephants apart by sight. They are both pretty good at being able to tell me which animals have boy parts and girl parts and because we've made it normal and explained that's how you tell, they don't stand and giggle and gawk and shriek like most of the elementary aged kids do. They are comfortable with the circle of life because we go watch the otter's at feeding time go catch the fish the keepers toss in. And then we watch the komodo dragon eat mice.

They could tell watching the giraffes play that the baby (no name yet, 2 weeks old) was playing with her older sister Olivia and their mommy Twiga was watching the game. Then we went and looked at the twin lion cubs and watched them play with their mommy's tail. They watch the animals and just have an appreciation for the families.

Seriously, though, befriend the keepers and get involved in the zoo education programs. The keepers will tell you the names and feeding times and habits of the animals. We watch the clock and go see elephant training and can always talk to those keepers. They will also tell you interesting things like most of the animals are on hormonal birth control and even sometimes there are oopsies, like our new baby giraffe.

The best time, I've found, to see the animals active is the day of a major weather change. Enjoy your zoo. We absolutely love ours.

Marissa