Off to the Zoo with My Niece

[maxcelcat]

Friday morning I took my niece to the Zoo. The zoo opens at 9AM, and she sleeps at midday so there was a window there where we could visit the zoo without her falling asleep.

Getting to the zoo early on a weekday is good and bad - good because there's no one there, at least until the school groups start turning up. Bad because some of the animals appeared to still asleep. The stupid Gorilla's for example.

I figured I'd aim for the most active and/or fluffy animals. Oh, and the butterflies - said niece is rather fond of them insects.

So we scampered around the zoo. The little monkeys and Lemur's were a hit, but I can report that the most interesting things at the zoo, in decreasing order, are:

• Other children and toddlers. A number of times I said "ignore the kids, look at the monkeys"!


• Seals, there was clapping whilst the seals swam


• The floor of the seal enclosure. It was metal and very textured


• Fish - there are some in the same building as the seals


• My chocolate muffin


• Butterflies


• The pigeons and seagulls that surrounded us while we had lunch


• Kangaroos and Emu's


• Elephants

I was surprised the mega fauna wasn't of more interest, they'd even got three adult elephants and two baby elephants holding each others tails and walking around the enclosure. I'd have taken a picture, but I was wrestling a pusher and a small flighty toddler! The tigers weren't up to much, nor were the lions, maybe that was it. I do feel sorry for some of the bigger critters there, there's not nearly enough space for them to move around.

She is so at that age were she bolts all over the place. I had to prevent her from wandering out of the butterfly enclosure three times, the door for some reason being very interesting!

I bought her a floppy stuffed elephant, which I'm told was a huge hit - she's been talking to it ever since, and singing the "Heidi, Heidi, Ho The great big elephant is so slow" song. I came home and needed a nap :-)