Adventure #8: The Oregon Zoo

One of my own personal goals is to live more during the week.  You know, not save all the fun stuff for the weekend.  So to further that goal I took the kids to the zoo on Tuesday.  The Oregon Zoo http://www.oregonzoo.org/  offers a great deal with $4 admission on the second Tuesday of every month.  This typically means that the zoo is insanely crowded.   However, by getting there after school at 230pm many people with preschoolers are heading home, so it wasn't too crazy.

Usually Owen and I get into an argument at the zoo because he just wants to rush around to whatever animal pops into his head, "let's see the polar bears!  Now let's go to the farm!  Now the bats!"   Whereas I prefer to do a more orderly exhibit to exhibit.  We compromised by starting in the zoo where he wanted, Stellar Cove, and then followed the paths around the zoo.  Watching the sea lions is amazing.  The exhibit is a full wall of windows into their swim tank.  Both boys enjoy watching the sea lions surprisingly serene swimming in the water.

As we walked around I realized a real problem with the zoo.  Many of the exhibits, especially in some of the older parts of the zoo aren't very wheelchair/stroller friendly.  Noah couldn't see the animals in most of the exhibits because the viewing area is at waist height.  So Noah was just hanging out while Owen and I looked at the animals.

There were a few animals Noah did really get to interact with.  The goats were in their petting zoo pen.  We were able to stick our hands through the fence and pet them.  Noah is always more engaged if he can use more than one sense to notice something.  For example, with the goats he could see and touch (and smell) them.  When we used the hand sanitizer afterword Owen just kept pumping the lever.  It took me a second (and Owen about 6 pumps) for me to realize Owen couldn't feel the sanitizer because it was foam.  He thought he wasn't getting any.  When I told him to check his hand he had a mount of sanitizer about 5 inches tall and 4 inches wide!  We were very clean.

Baby Sumara

After finishing up the African area of the zoo we went to get a snack.  I enjoyed this part the best.  And no, not because I love to eat!  It was really nice just to sit down with the kids and talk about what we had seen.  Noah loves salty foods, so he had some potato chips and Owen has a wicked sweet tooth, so he had cotton candy.  I let Noah hold his own bag and he did well not dumping all the chips out.  When Owen was done with his cotton candy, he looked at me to ask if he had any on his face.  I swear the entire lower half of his face, from his eyeballs down, was covered in cotton candy!  We cleaned up and finished the zoo.

We walked up the Great Northwest exhibit on our way out.  Noah liked the salmon I think because he could really see them and the water was splashing a little out of the tank onto us.  His hands down favorite was the bears.  Two of the bears were really lively.  They were snuggling and playing with each other.  Noah tried to crawl into their exhibit!  Mostly, I think he wanted to play in their dirt.  

We left the zoo after two and a half hours.  I was pretty pleased with getting out and having a fun afterschool afternoon for $12.  The very best part of my day was when Owen spontaneously hugged me and told me "thank you for bringing us here".