so many people...so little zoo

Today, because of Labor Day the boys were out of school and Brandon had the day off. I wasn't sure what we were going to do for the long weekend but once the weatherman told us, a few days ago, that the temps would be dropping from 104+ degrees every day to highs in the low to mid 80's starting on Sunday Brandon and I decided it would be alot of fun to take the boys to the zoo! We haven't been to the zoo in so long because of the extreme, record breaking temps here in Oklahoma and so we were excited not only to go to the zoo but also simply to get outside!! I knew the zoo would be busy today since it's a holiday and also because of the break in the heat but I thought we could beat the crowds by arriving at the zoo super early. The zoo opened at 9AM today and we pulled up to the parking lot (or tried to at least...) at 9:20AM. As we turned the corner to head toward the zoo parking lot there was a line of cars backed up just to get to the stop light that you turn at to go into the zoo!!!! I was shocked!!!! And the line of cars trying to get in was coming from both directions!!!! Like I said, I knew it would be busy today but I wasn't expecting this!!!! After waiting patiently for our turn to even get into the zoo parking lot (and we had to park in overflow parking!) we then waited patiently yet again driving around looking for a parking spot. Once we found one, we made the long walk to the zoo entrance...

Thankfully, we are zoo members and so we got to skip the admission line and head straight to the members only entrance where it takes a fraction of the time to get through the line because you only have to show your membership card and are allowed to go straight into the zoo. If we had had to wait to pay to enter the zoo it would have probably taken us at least another half hour of waiting in line. The zoo had set up the curvy chain link line chines in front of the ticket window and once the line left the curvy crowd controller it backed up all across the sidewalk in front of the zoo. It was pure madness!!!! We pretty much walked straight in, though, and tried to beat the looming crowds to all of our favorite animal exhibits before they got so busy we couldn't enjoy them. The boys always want to see the monkeys, the bears and the lions. The lions were still kind of snoozing when we walked by but the bears and monkeys were pretty entertaining! They bears were swimming in the little creek that runs through their habitat and the monkeys were playing tag!

We also got to see the zoo's new baby elephant for the first time!! Even now, the zoo staff only allows the baby elephant into the habitat yard for limited amounts of time as she is very young and still learning all the basic skills of being an elephant and until today we had never been lucky enough to see her roaming free...but today we got to see her!! She seems so tiny and is very very cute!! You can tell she is just learning to use her trunk and is even still a bit clumsy on her feet!! It was exciting to watch her explore her yard. She is a very independent little thing too...she hardly went close to the grown up elephants at all!!

Before leaving the zoo, we made a stop in the Children's Zoo. The kids love to play in the open spaces and today they played hide and seek among the bushes, faux tree stumps and overgrown man-made leaf tunnels that are scattered around the play area. I love that my boys love to play together!!

We packed our lunch for the zoo today but we did let the boys each buy an animal shaped souvenir juice drink at the concession stand before we left. They both chose the shark!!

We had an awesome day trip to the zoo!! Sure it was busy but I would much rather fight the crowds then endure 100+ degree heat!! Plus, when it's a bit cooler the animals are more active and so we have much more fun too!!