Nic Jones (![[info]](http://www.insanejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} nicwrites) wrote,@ 2009-01-07 09:22:00 |
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Zoo
Jen and I went to the Melbourne Zoo today. It was tremendously hot and I'm exhausted, but we had a great time.
Some of the animals were just as over the heat as we were, and so were hiding in shady holes. The zoo has an Australian loop with red earth and the heat was painfully apropos.
The bears were having fun splashing about and the baboons were going nuts over something. There was an awfully cute Sumatrian surili. I liked the cats - the caracal was particularly spectacular.
I loved how close you could get to the animals - the giant old tortoises, for example, used to be penned off behind a 1m fence, but are now in a pen with only a low, log fence stopping them from wandering too far. One of the two was at the fence and didn't mind being petted. The peacock happily walked along the railing of his enclosure fence, posing for photos like the fabulous thing he is. The Australian loop was closed at either end by a double gate and while the big red kangaroos were fenced off the rest of the animals could wander onto the winding path if they felt like it.
The lemurs were on their own island and couldn't really be seen, though, which was a bit disappointing. And the red pandas, while cute, where waaaay waaay up in their trees where they were pretty hard to see.
The worst-behaved animals were the screaming children. Ungh. Twice I almost tripped over one little child in his hurry to push in front of anyone and everyone. One little girl took it upon herself to wait until her parents had moved onto the next cage, dump a handful of dirt and rocks into my sandals and run off. There were kids banging on the glass wherever there was glass (and not a single window wasn't greasy with face and hand-prints at toddler height.) One child hoped to provoke the birds into - well, something, by screaming at the top of his lungs at each of them. His mum chose to simply ignore this.
Seriously, folks, it's called a condom.
And it would be nice if you didn't wander around the zoo smoking. Also, those double-door/gate-airlock things are there for a reason, and it's not so that you can hold both doors wide open to cool yourself down a bit while you wait for your spawn to catch up to you as you exit the butterfly house.
It took most of a full day to see all the exhibits. We arrived at around 11:30 and were done just before closing time at 5:00. We stopped to munch on our picnic stuff a couple of times and for our picnic lunch. (Jen made dinosaur cookies!) Dragging the picnic stuff around in the heat was a pain, but well worth it given the spectacular prices being asked for food and drink inside the zoo.
The zoo is building a new aquatic exhibit. Seeing that would probably have required getting there a little earlier, though maybe on a cooler day you could get through faster.
Jen and I went to the Melbourne Zoo today. It was tremendously hot and I'm exhausted, but we had a great time.
Some of the animals were just as over the heat as we were, and so were hiding in shady holes. The zoo has an Australian loop with red earth and the heat was painfully apropos.
The bears were having fun splashing about and the baboons were going nuts over something. There was an awfully cute Sumatrian surili. I liked the cats - the caracal was particularly spectacular.
I loved how close you could get to the animals - the giant old tortoises, for example, used to be penned off behind a 1m fence, but are now in a pen with only a low, log fence stopping them from wandering too far. One of the two was at the fence and didn't mind being petted. The peacock happily walked along the railing of his enclosure fence, posing for photos like the fabulous thing he is. The Australian loop was closed at either end by a double gate and while the big red kangaroos were fenced off the rest of the animals could wander onto the winding path if they felt like it.
The lemurs were on their own island and couldn't really be seen, though, which was a bit disappointing. And the red pandas, while cute, where waaaay waaay up in their trees where they were pretty hard to see.
The worst-behaved animals were the screaming children. Ungh. Twice I almost tripped over one little child in his hurry to push in front of anyone and everyone. One little girl took it upon herself to wait until her parents had moved onto the next cage, dump a handful of dirt and rocks into my sandals and run off. There were kids banging on the glass wherever there was glass (and not a single window wasn't greasy with face and hand-prints at toddler height.) One child hoped to provoke the birds into - well, something, by screaming at the top of his lungs at each of them. His mum chose to simply ignore this.
Seriously, folks, it's called a condom.
And it would be nice if you didn't wander around the zoo smoking. Also, those double-door/gate-airlock things are there for a reason, and it's not so that you can hold both doors wide open to cool yourself down a bit while you wait for your spawn to catch up to you as you exit the butterfly house.
It took most of a full day to see all the exhibits. We arrived at around 11:30 and were done just before closing time at 5:00. We stopped to munch on our picnic stuff a couple of times and for our picnic lunch. (Jen made dinosaur cookies!) Dragging the picnic stuff around in the heat was a pain, but well worth it given the spectacular prices being asked for food and drink inside the zoo.
The zoo is building a new aquatic exhibit. Seeing that would probably have required getting there a little earlier, though maybe on a cooler day you could get through faster.