Tuesday at the Zoo

So on Tuesday, when we got up, we had to take the rental car back. All of us were a little sad, because that meant the end of our vacation. There had been discussions about what to do... some talk of going to the Heard Museum, but dad and DH were not interested, and we didn't want to split up on the last day. We ended up going to the Wildlife World Zoo, only about 15 miles from home.

It is a private zoo, and reminded me of the zoo in the movie "We Bought a Zoo." After getting over the sticker shock, we had a wonderful day. The ground is hard enough so that even though there are not too many sidewalks, it wasn't too hard to push mom's wheelchair.

They have an aquarium with interactive displays. I touched a starfish!

And a manta ray, but didn't get a picture of that. The starfish didn't feel like anything in particular, but the mantas were soft but muscular. Quite amazing!

These frogs are about 1 inch long! I love the colors.

There were many, many birds.

This was one of the highlights: I fed the giraffes! This guy knew his way around a feeding station, and he would wait for me to put a little food in my hand and hold it out, then he would grab my hand (with his tongue) and I would pour it on there. I don't think he dropped a morsel. I did it 5 or 6 times, because we wanted pictures on all media. We e-mailed a picture to DD2 and C and P, and heard back very shortly that C was jealous and wanted to be there! It would have been a lot of fun to have them.

DH and I went on the overhead tram. It was very nice! It was quiet, restful, and gave you a good overview of the whole park.

Can you see mom & dad in the above picture? No? Okay, here:

They are in the bottom left corner, resting and waiting for us to return. The weather was lovely, warm in the sun, cool in the shade. There was enough shade that I didn't even get sun-burned.

Here's a view of my feet and knees, above a resting kangaroo. The ride is so quiet that it doesn't disturb the animals at all.

After enjoying the animals we went to the restaurant attached to the zoo. We sat out in the patio and had this view from the edge of the patio.

And this view from the table. I kept catching something black out of the corner of my eye, so I pulled out the camera, and we discovered that the back edge of the flamingo wings is pitch black! (You can see it on the 2 pairs of outstretched wings.)

We had a lovely day! and a great vacation! We are going to have to start saving our pennies for next year! Getting 10 days of sunshine in February lifts me right up out of the blues, and that could easily become a habit.