San Diego | Part II | The Zoo

The world-famous San Diego Zoo was exactly that....a total ZOO. 

It probably didn't help that we chose to visit on (what I thought was) probably the busiest day of the year (Saturday before Easter when everyone was off work and visiting on Spring Break). 

Luckily, we were able to get there right when it opened, and we managed to avoid massive crowds for the first few hours. 

The zoo organizes the animals by continent...first stop was to "Australia" and the koalas!

{And yes, Ella had to have a zoo bubble. Are you surprised?!}

Moving on...

The zoo had this whole major elephant exhibit. They had a care center where the elephants go to get baths, eat, and even get pedicures! Here is an elephant enjoying a watermelon. 

One thing I noticed about the San Diego Zoo is how well the animals are cared for here. I usually get really sad at zoos; I feel bad that these animals are trapped in such tight living quarters. But all of the areas at this zoo seemed more than spacious for the animals, and they were really well-kept. I also saw zookeepers everywhere, taking care of the animals, which I don't think I've seen as much of at other zoos. 

Here is an example, with the zookeeper feeding some animals.

A few weeks before our visit, a baby jaguar was born! You can see him on the right side of the picture below...the water bowl is on the left just for a size comparison! He was so tiny!

One thing that was included with our almost $50 (!!!!) tickets was a sky ride taking you over the zoo. Trav and I are both terrified of heights, but we decided it was something we should do. 

The views were pretty cool, as long as the wind didn't blow! Here is a view of the elephant area.

Once we got off the sky ride, it started getting pretty crowded. 

We also ended up getting lost, pushing the stroller up and down super steep hills, and ended up in this aviary. 

These monkeys (sorry, I don't know their "real" name) were so hilarious. They were flat out cray-cray...basically the one guy was chasing the girl monkeys around and, um....banging (?!) them! Then he would move on to another girl. I was dying from laughing. And my child had a front row seat to all of the action. Great...

Oh, and then they took a break to eat. The monkey on the left is throwing his hand up to catch his food.

And then...the PANDAS!

Yep, we waited in line for 45 minutes to see these guys. (PS my parents went last Monday and did not have to wait at all!) By the time we got up to see them, Ella was totally not interested whatsoever.

After the pandas, we were 110% DONE. It was so ridiculously crowded, we couldn't get up to see any of the other animals, and we were tired of pushing Ella up these huge, steep hills. 

So we took one family picture and got the heck out of there!

I'd love to go back to this zoo on a much less crowded day! It was a fun place, but just wayyyyy too many people the day we were there!

Next, I'll wrap up our time in San Diego (oh, but then there is also LA to blog about, so I'm far from being done)!!