The first term school holidays are coming to an end and whilst I'm a little sad to get back into the school / kinder routine, we have had a wonderful break together and got to do some fun things, including a trip to the zoo a little over a week ago with some of Zac and Seb's friends.
We've been super blessed to have such amazing weather so far into the Autumn season and this Friday in particular was a warm, sunny 26 degree day. The perfect day for a trip to the zoo. Unfortunately about 5000 other people had the same idea and we spent a good hour driving around looking for a car park before we actually got inside. But once we were safely parked and through the gates, everything just went right.
Zac's friend Tash and her little brother Mitchell (who goes to kinder with Seb) joined us with their mum Nicky. First on the agenda was a trip past the lion keep for Tash who is currently obsessed with the tv show The Lion Guard. We rocked up right as the zoo keeper was beginning a talk about the lions they currently have there and it was packed. We managed to position ourselves along the side of the glass enclosure and started listening. We initially thought we were going to be out of luck and unable to see them but they ended up roaming over to our side and stopped directly against the glass in front of us. It was amazing. Even I, after all these years of going to the zoo, had never seen them that close up. I'm pretty sure Tash's day was made in the first 20 minutes of arriving (Super sad I didn't get any photos of this part).
Next up was a trip to the reptile centre for Zac who has a scary obsession with snakes. I honestly have no idea where this love for snakes comes from and I certainly hope that he understands how dangerous they are out in the wild (I've certainly tried drilling that message into him plenty of times). After viewing the first 3 or so snakes, Zac became more excited about running around with Tash that the rest went mostly unseen. The two of them began a game of switching prams (we bring the pram every time now after learning the hard way that little legs get tired pretty quickly at the zoo) and this game continued between the 4 little people for the rest of the afternoon. Nicky and I had to keep trading off who would push the heavier kids up the hills. We ended up taking a break for lunch, ice creams so that Nicky and I could rest while the kids explored nearby and played in the trees. Zac has decided that he doesn't like ice cream at the moment but Seb and I certainly enjoy a cone each.
After lunch we headed to the butterfly enclosure. The last time we came to the Zoo we all loved it so much but kind of rushed through it. This time, Seb was so excited to go through it that we really took our time and I am so so SO glad that we did as it was incredible (and the highlight for my day at least). I've never had a butterfly land on me at the zoo but they were in full swing that day and all of us had butterflies landing on us multiple times. Zac was a bit scared and unsure about the idea of having one land on his hand but he did have one on his hat and one stage. It flew off right as I pulled my camera out so I missed that shot BUT... I did get quite a few of Tash and Seb with them. They were so excited they were just about bursting.
The trick to getting a butterfly to land on you is to stand super still with your arm up in the air and use the back of your hand as a landing platform. It usually takes a few minutes (and you will most certainly have a tired arm by the end of it) but once they land, you can carefully pass them to one another. They sort of just hop from one hand / finger to someone elses.
We spent a few hours wandering around and looking at the elephants, monkeys (another highlight... there is always this one monkey who swings over and sits right up on the window and stares at you), giraffes, zebras etc. We were just about to call it a day and head towards the exit when we walked past a window that allowed us to see some big beautiful fish under the water. Mitchel has a fascination with fish so we decided to stop to let him enjoy it. What we didn't realise until about 10 minutes later, was that directly behind us was another underwater window that had hippos in it. Once we discovered that little gem the kids went nuts and just loved watching the hippo swim right up and past the window. It was pretty cool and something we hadn't seen before.
Seb took up the Zoo map and led us on a journey to the exit. He called it his treasure map and brought it home with him. He keeps telling me that we have to go back to see the "giant tur-twoss" (tortoise) as we still haven't seen them. I bought us all an annual Zoo membership so we can go back as many times as we want so I'm planning to take him back there in a couple of weeks when Zac is at school. I don't think Zac enjoys the Zoo trips as much as Seb and I so I don't think he will mind missing out every now and then.
All up, it was such a great day and it was a really fun experience going with friends. However I think we will save ourselves the stress and not go during the school holidays next time.
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