California - San Diego Zoo

After spending two days at the beach, we headed to the San Diego Zoo.  When we were planning our trip to California, we actually made a lot of our arrangements around our plans for the zoo.  I had read an article about great adventures for kids and one of the items was to see the pandas at the San Diego Zoo.  When Luke was about two he picked out a stuffed panda at the Bean Museum gift shop and it has been one of his favorite pets ever since.  Both he and Ruby love pandas so we decided to take advantage of the fact that the San Diego Zoo is so close since they are one of the few zoos in the United States with pandas.  It turned out to have been a great idea.  The zoo is awesome, so big and with so many fascinating animals - all in very natural type settings.

We arrived at the zoo early and first saw the flamingos.

Then it was off to see the pandas.  We had signed up for an early morning panda adventure where we would be able to learn more about the bears and get to see them up close before the zoo opened.

When we arrived at the panda enclosure we immediately saw Xiao Liwu - sitting and eating and looking as though he had been expecting us.  There were only about 10 of us in the group so we were able to get quite close and spent about 20 minutes observing.  Our guides told us all sorts of details about Xio Liwu and his mother, who is also at the zoo.  We watched him eat and were amazed at his powerful jaw and the way he was able to eat the bamboo.  The panda wasn't active at all, but it was still somehow fascinating just to watch him sit in one place and eat.  The area was quiet and serene and it was easy to transport yourself to a far away land where there is plenty of magic.

  

After spending time with the Giant Panda, we were introduced to Clark the red panda.  He was super active and we had the best time watching his antics as he looked for treats and climbed the trees.

 Part of our tour included an early morning tour of some of the most popular animals.  We got lucky and saw several animals that are apparently quite elusive - our guide was actually shocked when we came around the corner and saw these two snow leopards posed on the rock. Apparently they spend nearly all day in hiding.  We ended up seeing bears, lions, and oh my, it was awesome to be able to watch these animals so closely without any crowds.

So the panda and popular animal tour were awesome, but our last stop of the day might have been my favorite.  As we approached the giraffe enclosure, our guide stopped and said we had time to visit one last animal.  The zoo was just opening and there were a few people around so when she opened the locked gate, I thought we were just going to get a front row view.  But then she grabbed several branches, gave us all some leaves and said we could feed the giraffes.  It was awesome!  While we were there we learned a lot of facts about giraffes but mostly just spent our time watching them - they are such gentle, graceful creatures and it was so cool to be able to observe them up close.   

 

We watched a tree full of the cutest koalas, then had even more fun watching our own little critters climb around.  Turns out the kids must need that second thumb to help them climb.

Spent a lot of our time exploring Africa.

Life is better under the sea

The real polar bears were camera shy, but we sure had fun watching them eat their fish popsicles and wander around with their buddies.  Luke and Ruby thought these guys might be a little safer anyway.

We even found some wild animals on the loose

This mama ape was way too tired to show us any attention

Luckily these apes were willing to play.

 The skyride across the zoo was the perfect last look at all of the exhibits.