Management has been determined to make a trip to the zoo for awhile now, and we finally committed. It’s a great zoo, a natural habitat zoo, with a lot of large, open spaces that mimic the animals’ home environs. Yesss, the Manager realizes all arguments that zoos exploit animals for the purpose of entertaining humans… We enjoyed ourselves, however, and appreciated the lack of cages and amazing animals who did not appear very tortured. Here are the highlights. Please note my zoom wasn’t a-workin’’ at all, the effect of which was more amusing than anything…

 

inchworm!

 

gator

 

cougar, napping

 

N.Lo looking at more gators 

 

K.Lo saying, gimmee your camera! (please)

 

 

she wanted to take a few pictures of the gators and the “dead, icky dragonfly”

 

 

there’s a giraffe in this photo, somewhere

  

 

a bald eagle – injured and rescued, no longer able to fly

 

seeea lions

 

 

hi, sea lion! hi!

 

puffins, possibly the greatest word and bird ever

 

we didn’t think we’d see any polar bears due to warm weather, buuut…

that was probably my favorite moment of the day

 

this water/paintbrush/giant chalkboard may have been the employees’ fav

 

(a kid N.Lo’s size fell in the other bucket minutes later. scary. his grandma felt terrible.)

 

elephants!!!

 

lots of sculptures/photo ops throughout the zoo

 

 

 

helicoptor like those used in elephant tracking… had to be tested out by all employees – er, the CEO and the employees

 

more elephants, both babes I think

 

 

the rhino sculpture… first pose reminded me of the elephant challenge in antm thailand

 

 

the real rhinos… cough. somewhere off in the distance.

 

egg sculpture

 

favorite picture of the day right here:

 

more sculpture climbing and photo op

 

 

we *just* missed lemur playtime! they were all taking an afternoon nap in that log.

 

chimpanzees, with one on the rock looking very thoughtful.

 

 

k.lo then proceeded to take about 10 shots that looked just like this one…

 

Manager and staff chimp sculpture

 

 

some super-awesome river hogs with whippy, fly-swatting ears

 

there’s a lady lion sleeping back there

 

and an ostrich! and more giraffe specks!

 

Overall, highly excellent company excursion, in spite of the camera-zoom fail.