Cleveland: Day at the Zoo

Early Monday morning, my mom took us to the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo. Like I mentioned before, Adam and I visited back in December of 2010 when my parents had first moved out to Cleveland (we actually went on New Years Eve when entry was free and they had activities for kids). Last time, there were very few animals out (except for the bears, wolves, and indoor animals, like the koalas), this time the animals were out in full force. It was also a pretty busy day - Cleveland residents had free admission and there were tons of school groups.

When you first walk in, you're greeted by the new African Elephant Crossing. This part wasn't open when we visited last time, so it was definitely neat to see. The elephants were so beautiful - their eyelashes killed me. They're so long and pretty. The elephant section also had a few meerkats, which I love and always get a kick out of the funny things they do. 

We continued walking towards the Australian Adventure, which we didn't get to see much of last time. This time we saw an adorable koala sitting in a tree outside of the main koala house. He was being such a ham for the camera. My favorite part of the Australian adventure was the lorikeet aviary. These birds are seriously gorgeous.

We walked towards the Wallaby Walkabout and I found something to play with - kangaroo ears. Apparently their large ears are great for hearing just about everything, including kids screaming their heads off, poor little guys (the kangaroos, not the kids).

Walking back around on our way towards the bears, we caught some giraffes being silly.

I'm always amazed at how many bear species they have at the Cleveland Zoo and how they all look so different from each other.

This pretty much sums up how I was feeling after walking around for a few hours in the hot weather.

On our way out, we paid the extra few bucks and headed over to the Rainforest. Although it was a thousand degrees outside and inside the Rainforest, I still really loved this place. I'm kind of a sucker for anything Rainforest related, it's probably thanks to my Amazon Trail obsession, which I would play for hours upon hours as a kid. When you walk inside, there's a really pretty waterfall wall. Cue ambience.

Ok, so another factoid from my childhood. I was obsessed with frogs for a good 3-4 years. I think there was one time when I would only buy things with frogs on them (bookmarks, journals, kermit the frogs). I still have the frog earrings my parents bought me for Christmas one year. Anyway, I loved the frog display that was in this building. The frog on the left below was so rad - his eyes were closed, but the design on the lids made look like they were open. Mother nature is amazing.

This little guy was so sweet, I just had to include him in this update.

Now for the pièce de résistance. Say hello to sexy legs over here. I literally laughed out loud (LOLed) when I saw him (or her?) stand up and show their stuff. So funny. One other amazing thing happened when I was standing by these orangutans, they started interacting with the people on the other side of the glass. It was incredible.

We had a really great time at the zoo and I would love to return again someday! We may get that wish now that we're moving out to Pittsburgh this year. I can't wait to be closer to my parents and to be able to spend more time with them. We've lived at least 4-9 hours away from them for the last 10 years, so it's a long time coming.