A Day at the Zoo

Sunday, August 21, 2016
After church today, we took Beth to her favorite restaurant in Royal Oak, Lillys, while the boys were off doing some gardening work for their friend Clinton.  It was so nice having some time just with Beth while enjoying a fabulous meal.

By the time we got to her home, the guys were back, so we changed clothes and all of us headed to the zoo for the afternoon.  Us and thousands of others!  It sure was a busy place!!! But that is probably because there was a break in our high temperatures and today it has remained in the very low 80s with low humidity and grey skies. Here they all are in front of the bear fountains a favorite spot of mine since I was a little kid.

It has been quite a while since we've been to the zoo so we were anxious to see the new penguin house as well as the baby giraffe born just a little over a week ago.  Since the zoo is so close to their place, they go all the time.  We were amazed at all of the additions and changes in the place - it looks great!

The Penguin House was far more extensive than we expected.  This is a general shot of the major exhibit area of the penguins. It is huge and snow flakes fall regularly adding to the atmosphere of it.

This little guy came right over by the window and posed for a long time :-)

We then headed down the stairs to exhibits and underwater viewing area.  I was startled to find this neat transition from one to the other.  You go down a ramp and feel like you are in a explorer's ship in the arctic during a storm with all the crashing sounds.

Then past portholes with views of sea life.

The underwater views are really neat.

One other interesting spot is this huge corner screen of views of a glacier calving.  The thunderous sounds were so mindful of what we experienced in Alaska at the several different glaciers we visited.

At the Reptile House many of the exhibited reptiles were active - something you don't often see.  We enjoyed watching them move and eat like this legless lizard

A red panda was hiding up in a tree but I was able to see at least a part of him

Even the gorillas were up and moving around

This ring tailed lemur was out for a walk and poking about in the bushes

The giraffes had loads of people watching them.  It has been quite exciting for the people to see the baby giraffe who seems still to be just a little disoriented.  He was happiest when near his mama.

The kangaroos and wallabys were fairly active too as we walked through the area where they live.  It is neat to be able to actually be close to them without a fence to block our access. 

Wild Dingos are apparently a problem with pastured animals so the Australians build Dingo fences using mesh wire and anything they can find in the desert lands 

Peacocks wander all over the zoo. We found this one poking in a bush along side the sidewalk

Seldom have I seen the anteaters out poking around.  Here were two of them sticking very close to each other seeking ants

At the wonderful ring of life exhibit we saw several polar bears moving around an an arctic fox just scoping things out.

A seal was scooting around in the pool though he can't be seen in this shot since he was underwater.

But we did get better views of those seals once we were in the underwater viewing area.  It is neat to see the bears swimming too but none were in the water when we were there.

We passed this Tree Kangaroo

as we were heading for the exit since the zoo was closing for the day.

But what a delightful afternoon it was to share this place with our daughter and her family.  Our family home in Pleasant Ridge was less than a mile from this zoo and our kids grew up making many many visits there.  In fact, when they were very young it was free so a great place for taking stroller rides with mom pushing and letting them get out some to wander freely.  It sure brought back lots of memories.

Dean had put meat in the crock pot so we were invited back for a delicious dinner before heading back to our RV for the night.