Went to the zoo last week. It has been a while and we took the opportunity of a beautiful, warm February day to sneak down for a few hours in the late afternoon. We thought we would have the whole place to ourselves but as it turns out it was, well, at total zoo. If you like strollers then this was the place to be. It is amazing the stroller culture in the US. Man, some people blow a wad of money on strollers these days. Most interesting to me is the number of older kids who really had no business being pushed around in strollers. These kids are big enough to be running around and really could use the exercise in my opinion. I really think it is a control issue. It is easier for parents to schlep their older kids around in strollers and keep tabs on them. But really now, five year old kids in strollers?
But I digress. The zoo as always is amazing. They have really been pumping some money into the place over the last few years. Biggest improvement is the new "Asia Trail" which is quite nice and fun. Lots of cool animals to see including my favorite, the "Maned Wolf" from Asia. The best kept secret and our favorite place of all is the Invertebrate House located behind and underneath the Small Mammal House. Never a crowd there and lot of cool things going on. Our favorite is the Octopus feeding and the cuttle fish-whenever they have live cuttlefish. Apparently these highly developed invertebrates actually do not live very long (two to three years) and there are periods where they do not have them. However, when they do it is well worth the time to visit the invertebrate house just to see them. Lots of spiders and cool bugs and things for kids to put their hands on.
If you have not been to the National Zoo in a while then put it on your list of places to go revisit. You will be glad you did.
