Day 2: San Diego Zoo
5 May
After a night of relaxing, Sarah and I decided to go explore what is considered the nation’s number one zoo: The San Diego Zoo! It is the largest and most progressive zoo in the world with over 4,000 animals and more than 800 different species. It is also one of a small few that hosts a giant panda. After spending about thirty minutes trying to find a parking space we managed to get one fairly close to the entrance of the park.
Armed with my Nikon D40, Sarah and I ventured in to the zoo (after paying the semi-pricey entrance fee). The park exhibits are designed around a type of habitat, and include different animals that can be found side by side in the wild. The exhibits also contain native plant life which compliments the animal. Exhibits range from artic tundra to african rain forests, and include large free-flight aviaries.
We started our San Diego Zoo Safari Adventure (TM) by heading right and encountered our first animal, a koala. These little guys were enjoying their day relaxing in their “natural habitat”. Next up we entered a walk in aviary with hundreds of tropical birds, waterfalls, and rainforest flora. It was quite breathtaking. Afterwards, we ended up taking a overhead gondola lift called the skyfari, which took us across the entire length of the park and gave me the opportunity to take some fantastic aerial photographs. Once we disembarked, we were lucky enough to catch the Giant Panda exhibit and took some hilarious photographs of the pandas peeking out from their sleeping cave. These specific pandas are being bred in captivity and then eventually released into their native habitats due to Giant Pandas being an endangered species.
Next up, Sarah and I entered the “Monkey Trails and Forest Tales” exhibit, which is home to more than 30 species of mammals, reptiles, amphibians, and 30 species of African and Asian birds. We went across a walkway that brought us into a tree canopy with rare and endangered species of monkeys and then ventured across a forest path that brought us to see very noble looking apes.
Further up the trail we made it to the “Sun Bear Forest” which is a special habitat created for Bornean sun bears. The canopy of this forest was formed by leaves and branches of palms and ficus trees, while bamboo and giner create the mid-canopy. Bornean sun bears are some of the smallest bears in the world and are named after the golden crescent pattern on their chests.
