A Wild One

Good day, dear readers! Are you ready for a wild one? An adventure with the wild ones that is.

My mom and I took a visit to the zoo this past weekend and though it was a drizzly, grey day, the animals were collectively more active than I have seen in a long time. Allow me to tell you about it.

Mama and me at the world famous San Diego Zoo

We made it to the zoo and it was quite grey and misty out, but there were a surprising amount of people in Balboa Park. Probably all assuming like we had that San Diegans seek shelter whenever the blue in the sky is absent. 

There is a LOT of construction and remodeling happening around the zoo. The entrance is being changed and is currently in a temporary structure that I'm pretty sure was a trailer painted an extraordinarily bright green. 

We entered the zoo and made our way to the Koala area. We ooed and awed at the little grey fluffs hanging out in the trees by their little heaters, of which we were jealous!

We saw a baby wallaby be groomed by mama wallaby and then the little tyke hopped right up into mama's pouch and disappeared! It was so precious!

From there we walked over to the giraffes and apparently, you can feed the giraffes now on Saturdays and Sundays. It was amazing to watch people feed these gentle giants. Their big ol' heads and necks reached over a gate so that they could extend their long, grey tongues to take biscuits out of the hands of tourists. And yes, people were selfie-ing with the giraffes as they plucked food from their hands. That part tarnished the moment a bit, but then there was a baby giraffe that was just barely taller than me. So cute! He was born in May and he was his mama's eleventh baby! Did you know that when giraffes are born they are technically dead? It's the kaboom with the ground dropping from mama's elevated backside that starts their hearts! What amazing animals!

After the giraffes we crept by a sleeping rhino (would not want to accidentally wake a breathing tank!) We started to head over to the center of the park to try to find a place for coffee. It was freezing! En route, we passed some awake grizzly bears! They were ENORMOUS! One was napping, but simultaneously digging with her long clawed paw. The other was crunching on a delicious looking salad. Eventually he finished his greens and moved on to dessert - grubs from a tree stump that he ripped apart. I've never seen the bears that active. It was incredible.

We hiked down the trail, admiring the incredible plants and trees on the way to the bottom of the hill. Eventually we took the Aviary Trail and looked at the colorful birds. When we reached the top of the hill we found what we desired - coffee. Although, there was a moment of fright when we found this sign:

We hung out with the baby orangutan and her family. We watched little otters swim to their hearts content. We were right at the window when the male tiger prowled by - I loved that. We also saw a snow leopard leap from the top of his enclosure to prowl right beside us. I could have pet a snow leopard if I had been so inclined to reach my hand through the fence we were so close, but it is never wise to pet something with the word leopard in its name. (Hey, that's a reference!) The day of animal activity was just spectacular. The last really cool thing we saw was a young male jaguar. He was enjoying lunch, but when he was through he started to cry out for his mama. It was soooooo heart breaking. The keeper kept telling us that he was like a kindergartner who wasn't quite used to being away from mama yet. This didn't make any of us feel better. Rest assured that mama was reintroduced to him, but we all still felt for the little guy.

Looking for the smallerish human

There was one part of the park that was really interesting. The zoo has an animal ambassador program where they have cheetahs and Labradors, wolves and labs, and a few other buddies together in a long pen. We had a lovely lady cheetah out and about with her friend. They were running around together and playing. We were able to see the cheetah bolt, and I mean BOLT through the exhibit, probably a 100 foot dash when she locked onto something, which I'm pretty sure was a small human. If you're curious about the Ambassador program at the zoo, Nicole Payer did an interesting article explaining the program, which you can read "Dogs and Cheetas Living Together." 

We eventually made our way to the front of the park. We bought souvenir tumblers so that we could have another cup of coffee. The nice thing about these tumblers is that we'll get 99 cent refills on all beverages (except beer) on all future visits. And it's a nice tumbler, so I'm excited to use it. I also bought a pin and a fleece - did you know that this is a special year for the zoo? This year marks the centennial of our town's zoo, which originally composed of a bear, a lion, a few flamingos, some borrowed ostriches from the ostrich farm, and a cigarette smoking chimp. Ah, the early 20th century. Actually, I can't remember if the chimp was a part of the zoo during the Panama Exhibition or if he came later with the World's Fair in the 30s. I'll let you know once I remember.

Until then, though, I wish you a happy week and that you enjoyed this wild escape.

Your humble author,
S. Faxon