A zoo at the zoo

San Diego, CA

Today I decided to spend the day at the San Diego Zoo, and so apparently did the whole San Diego school system. It was the first day of Thanksgiving break for some of the local school boards and there was a special offer for kids to visit the zoo today. Wouldn’t you know. It is probably as busy on any day in the summer though and the lines for anything weren’t too long.

The 100 acre San Diego Zoo is situated in urban Balboa Park, and both it and the San Diego Museum of Man (buiiding which looks like it has a church clock tower attached) and other structures are remnants of the 1915 Panama-California Exposition, held to celebrate the opening of the Panana Canal. The zoo has 3700 animals, give or take a few, and no, I didn’t get a chance to see all of them.

I started my day at the zoo with the narrated bus tour (included in the one day pass) to get my bearings and get an overview of the zoo. Earlier is better for most of the popular activities and I only waited 15 minutes or so for the tour. It was really well done, and seeing some of the things from the bus meant that I didn’t have to walk back to see those areas that were out of the way.

The tour/driver pointed out that the zoo is also a botanical park and plants required for the feeding of some of the animals as well as just for display are grown throughout the property.

Then I wandered through the exhibits that I was interested in such as the monkeys, elephants, giraffes and pandas.

The longest line was to see the Panda Trek Exhibit. There was one lone two year old panda being shown today, and he was adorable. Well worth the 15 min wait in line to get my turn to walk past as slowly as possible.

One of the things they didn’t talk about but which I read about was an orangutan, named Ken Allen, who became famous in the 1980s after he escaped three times from enclosures which were thought to be escape-proof. He got the nickname “Hairy Houdini”, had his own fan club, and even had a song written about him. He died of cancer in 2000.

I ended the day taking the Skyfari Aerial Tram back to the entrance/exit area. It was a bit of a wait (15 mins) to get on, but it was a great way to get from the far back of the zoo back to the front to save wear and tear on tired body parts.

I will try and get to the Zoo’s Safari Park which is a larger park outside of the city associated with the Zoo where animals have much larger areas to wander. The animals are moved between the two facilities when necessary or for variety for the animals.

I came away, having enjoyed my day, but also thinking that I can’t wait to get to see these animals in the wild.