The Zoo

This afternoon the family took a trip to the Cincinnati Zoo. We've been there literally dozens of times before (we've had family passes for MOST of the kids' lives), and for the most part--after the first ten or so visits--there hasn't been much new. Sure, every now and then a new exhibit would get added, but it's pretty much the same.  but this was the first time we'd been to the zoo in a little more than a year, and I have to say--a lot had changed.

For starters, the old main entrance to the zoo is no longer the entrance to the zoo. It's now the BACK of the zoo, and the parking spots that used to be the prime spots--right next to the entrance--have been torn out and replaced with grass and a cheetah run.

And the giraffes are actually friendly now. I wrote a couple of years ago about the new giraffe exhibit, where the giraffes were supposed to get up close and personal with the visitors. Only back then the exhibit was brand new, and the giraffes were petrified of the people on the bridge and stayed as far away from us as possible.

That wasn't the case today. The giraffes now just hang out at the bridge during feeding time, waiting to get a cracker from dummies like me and my younger daughter who are willing to pay the zoo to give us food so that we can give it to the giraffes. It was fun, though.

What hadn't changed was how crowded the zoo is in the summer. But that's okay. It gives a festive feel to the place.

We purchased a family pass while we were at the zoo. It's good for a year, so we'll probably be back four or five more times between now and next August 30. So there'll be plenty of chances for more blog posts like this.