Today's not my last day of summer vacation, but tomorrow sure is! Sarah and I took advantage of the cool morning and went to the zoo on a weekday one last time before school starts again - just like last year! The zoo has been opening early because of the heat, so we got there before the crowds. We were one of 3 families at the polar bear exhibit, so she got some quality time with Nikita. She giggled each time he pushed off from the glass in front of her!
From there, we visited the sea lions and the tropics building. The white faced capuchins in the tropics building always seem a little aggressive to me (but it kind of makes watching them a lot more interesting than some of the other animals). Here, Sarah and the female have a stare down during snack time!
We also discovered that one of Sarah's favorite toys is also one of the toys the monkeys play with! (Here's a hint, monkey. The pink one is the hardest to open - you have to turn it!!!)
After that, we walked up to the lorikeets for feeding time. There are no pictures of this because one hand was holding Sarah and the other was holding the juice for the birds to eat! Again, we had it almost to ourselves - there was only one other family in there with us. This meant that we got lots of refills in our tiny juice cup and had the attention of lots of birds. At one point, there were three birds on me! We kept feeding the birds until Sarah got really upset that she couldn't touch them...and then I distracted her with a carousel ride.
This is where the Gold Level membership pays off - unlimited carousel rides!! Sarah pointed to the elephant when I asked her which one she wanted to ride, and I went with it.
Surprisingly, she was okay with riding just once. We walked to the Discovery Barn and I let her run loose! She loved squawking back at the parrots (really, it was just yelling) and climbing on the frog slide.
The lemurs were all lined up along the windowsill, which she didn't care about but I thought was pretty funny!
We said our grudging good-byes to the parrots and then walked past the new tiger exhibit (it was really cool, but it will be cooler when the tigers are in it!) to Australia. This is one of my favorite parts of the zoo. The kangaroos just kind of hang out, and people walk around them as best they can. A couple of larger kangaroos were even laying on their backs in the grass with their feet straight up in the air!
We completed the "old zoo" circuit and called it quits. It was lunchtime, and Sarah was getting cranky about it! Since we skipped Africa altogether, I let her ride the carousel two more times before we left. The first time around, she rode the KSU wildcat. The second time, she rode the MU tiger...
And just for some perspective, here's a comparison of last year's trip and this one! (I love that it's the same monkey in the picture, too!)
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