Zoo Hike

 Last Friday, we were lucky enough to go on a family night hike at the zoo. After weeks of heat, we were enjoying a cool down and headed to the zoo in pants & sweatshirts!The beautiful weather was just a bonus! We were the only family participating in the evening's hike, so it was like we had our own private tour of the zoo. The zoo was practically empty as we headed to the aquarium and then made stops at the manatees, tortoises, penguins & alligators. We learned lots of information about the animals, and the kids got to do some fun activities throughout the evening.

Manatees are one of my favorite animals, and the Columbus Zoo is one of only three facilities outside of Florida that can have them. We spent a lot of time watching this "little" (at just 200 lbs) gal named Pixie. The docent said that her handlers were still bottle-feeding her because they had never seen her eating lettuce. Well, we watched her gobble down a whole head of Romaine happily! She stayed right up close to the glass the entire time we were there, which was a special treat.

Love this photo of Darren!

Everyone is excited to get a closer look at Pixie!

I am not sure what Kyrie is doing in this picture, but it was too funny not to include!

The tortoises were sleeping by the time we got to their exhibit. Night was coming fast, and the kids ran & jumped & climbed on the walk over. We all learned some interesting facts about the animals!

The cool evening brought most of the penguins out around their pool, so we had a great opportunity to see them up close. After learning about penguins, they got to dress-up and pretend to be penguins. They also played a fishing game that taught us about sustainable fishing by introducing us to fish populations that are over-fished.

Kyrie, the penguin!

Our last stop of the night was the Conservation Building where we learned more about alligators and had the opportunity to pet a baby one. The entire evening was very informative and just a really special time for our family to spend together enjoying the zoo.