We Love the Zoo

My mom and I took the kids to the Portland Zoo yesterday. I'm not sure who likes the zoo better, me or the kids, but it's probably me. It was a bit chilly by Portland standards--low 40's--but with coats and hats we were just fine. Actually I think the animals were more active with the cooler temperature. Here's Carly and Isaac watching an animal they're pretty familiar with, a black bear.

A mountain lion--I think I would rather meet a black bear out in the wilderness than one of these.

The polar bears were also very active. Swimming, walking, jumping. They have two polar bears in Portland and the male is noticeably bigger than the female. He was just enormous.

This was actually a mandrill, but I first thought it was a baboon and told Carly so. She was pretty excited to the animal to her favorite saying, "See you soon you big baboon!"

The elephants--also very active

In the indoor elephant pen was the new baby, Sammy, and his mother. This little guy is only 6 months old. Portland is known for it's elephants. They have a pretty large herd for a zoo. The big one in the picture above is the male leader, Tusko. The granddaddy of the herd, Packy, was in the back field by himself. He was actually the first asian elephant to be bred in captivity back in 1962 at the Oregon Zoo.

The penguins being much more photo genic than I remember in the past. They had just been fed, maybe that's why.

One of the last animals we saw was this giraffe. He was in his indoor pen that has a viewing window, and for some reason he was licking the window like crazy. Carly thought it was pretty funny. She said he was a crazy giraffe.