"Can we go to the beach when you're home?"
It's a simple-enough question, with a simple-enough answer.
But sometimes a day at the beach with one kid becomes a weekend in Calgary with two, and that's exactly what happened on my days off at the end of April.
Beach on Friday, zoo on Saturday? Sure, why not.
All three of us had been to the Calgary Zoo before, but every visit is different. There were new displays, new animals out and about, and afterward, I decided to play with black & white for a slightly new take on some old favourites.
We were all fans of the penguins.
These guys and their eyebrows!
Meerkats.
Black and white on black and white.
And this superstar pose.
He legit winked at me!!!!
I took so many pictures of these silly-looking things.
and you could go right into 'Land of Lemurs'!
She wanted to see the giraffes.
Baby gorilla sucking his thumb: check.
I wanted to see the butterfly sanctuary.
Randomly patrolling the grounds...
Guess what day it is!
Hump Day!
He wanted to see the panda bears.
This guy was all about having his picture taken, but then got a little shy.
Tiger pose.
Ridiculous monkeys had us cracking up going after the food the keeper was tossing onto their enclosure.
This guy kinda made me wanna get up to 15% off insurance.
The baboon had so much expression in his eyes. He looks so sad.
I've been fortunate to have been taken behind the scenes at the Calgary Zoo. I know they treat the animals well. I know the animals do not spend their lives in one place unless they are required to due to sickness or injury, in which case they are taken care of. I know they are fed, entertained, and cared for down to the smallest detail.
But still, this tugged at my heartstrings a little more than I expected, and I had to walk away:
In the Canadian Wilds zone, the wolves were out, there was a bear at the top of a tree, and groundhogs made faces at my camera. The bighorn sheep were resting in the shade, the bison had a serious lack of cares in the world, and the mountain goat finally put himself on display for all to see!
The day was hot but the company was cool, and it was so fun to see a different array of animals than the last visit I had made to the zoo. It was also pretty neat to spend some time with these only slightly more domesticated creatures:
and to know that when their parents are away, I can always borrow the stunt-doubles for a good ol' fashioned road trip.
