Hot in the City
Ok, it's Take II of "Sportslady in the City."
Saturday morning, we headed off to Hotlanta. First Stop: Zoo Atlanta. Now, I've always loved going to the zoo... I remember one time as a kid counting all my pennies to see if I had enough money to take my parents to the zoo on a Sunday afternoon. As an adult, I have more of a love-hate relationship with the zoo. Some of the animals look really happy. Some of them look depressed and neurotic.
Zoo Atlanta is no exception. The elephants are obsessive-compulsive because they don't have a big enough area. On the other hand, the great apes have about 10 acres each. One of the encouraging things about Atlanta's zoo is that they have lots of baby animals. To me, that means the animals are fairly happy (miserable, unhealthy animals don't like to do the nasty). The baby orangutan is adorable.
The pandas seemed pretty happy, too (One of them has a sweet hammock). At first, I felt pretty bad for them, because though they have an outdoor play area, they were each inside a 20x20 pen with just a few toys and a plexiglass window to the outside world. Then I thought about it, and realized it was about 95 degrees outside and they were in the air conditioning while all us dumb-ass humans were standing outside in the miserable heat and humidity all day. I'd actually seen giant pandas before... they were visiting the Toledo Zoo in 1988, and I drove down a couple of times to see them. I've also been to the San Diego Zoo, but the line was so long to see their pandas that I didn't bother.
The most charismatic of all the animals was the red panda. We showed up at his little pen right at feeding time, and he came out to pose for the cameras for a few minutes. Honestly, he was working the crowd.
I was, however, very disappointed in the otter exhibit (usually my favorite part of the zoo). Just one lonely little otter. He looked like he was having a good time, splashing around in the water, but he could have used some little otter buddies.
Ok, it's Take II of "Sportslady in the City."
Saturday morning, we headed off to Hotlanta. First Stop: Zoo Atlanta. Now, I've always loved going to the zoo... I remember one time as a kid counting all my pennies to see if I had enough money to take my parents to the zoo on a Sunday afternoon. As an adult, I have more of a love-hate relationship with the zoo. Some of the animals look really happy. Some of them look depressed and neurotic.
Zoo Atlanta is no exception. The elephants are obsessive-compulsive because they don't have a big enough area. On the other hand, the great apes have about 10 acres each. One of the encouraging things about Atlanta's zoo is that they have lots of baby animals. To me, that means the animals are fairly happy (miserable, unhealthy animals don't like to do the nasty). The baby orangutan is adorable.
The pandas seemed pretty happy, too (One of them has a sweet hammock). At first, I felt pretty bad for them, because though they have an outdoor play area, they were each inside a 20x20 pen with just a few toys and a plexiglass window to the outside world. Then I thought about it, and realized it was about 95 degrees outside and they were in the air conditioning while all us dumb-ass humans were standing outside in the miserable heat and humidity all day. I'd actually seen giant pandas before... they were visiting the Toledo Zoo in 1988, and I drove down a couple of times to see them. I've also been to the San Diego Zoo, but the line was so long to see their pandas that I didn't bother.
The most charismatic of all the animals was the red panda. We showed up at his little pen right at feeding time, and he came out to pose for the cameras for a few minutes. Honestly, he was working the crowd.
I was, however, very disappointed in the otter exhibit (usually my favorite part of the zoo). Just one lonely little otter. He looked like he was having a good time, splashing around in the water, but he could have used some little otter buddies.
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