Photos by Isabel Epstein
I am, and always will be, one of the suckers willing to pay $14.50 to walk around in the 90 degree weather just to get a glimpse of the animals that only ever eat and sleep. Looking at it logically
, there is nothing about a zoo that would seem very appealing. The slight odor of animal poop lingers everywhere.
But I am a sucker for any small animal, so when I heard there were koalas at the zoo, I wanted to get over there as soon as possible. As the newest addition to the Kansas City Zoo,
Coedie and Burra are on loan from the San Diego Zoo for the next several months.
We visited them twice in the few hours we were there, and thoughthey had barely moved, I was enticed by them. Coedie and Burra just looked so soft and cuddly. They sat in the tree in the small enclosure just hanging out.
This goes for the whole zoo. The majority of the time I was there I was just staring at the animals and for most of them it wasn’t super interesting. I only really paid attention to a few exhibits, most of which were little and fuzzy or were an elephant. The dozens of kids wandering around were mesmerized by all of the animals, whether they were doing anything or not
One of the exhibits that did get my attention was the gorillas. Not only are gorillas just funny to look at, but there was gorilla baby in the enclosure as well. It was only about a year old and was struggling to climb a bush. It was adorable. There is no question this was the highlight of my zoo experience.
It was a nice day, so the zoo was full of families. I didn’t mind the abundance of kids around. The large crowd of people was much more prevalent when we went indoors. When we visited the penguin enclo
sure, we had to wiggle our way up to the glass to get a look of the emperor penguins.
My favorite exhibit overall was the animals that were from the colder areas of the world. This includes not only the penguins, but the polar bear Nikita, as well. I had the awesome experience of spending the night by this enclosure with my Girl Scout troop in elementary school, so this exhibit has always been one of my favorites. The placement of the observation room gives an interesting angle because you are looking up at the the polar bear.
I have been to several zoos over the course of my 15 years, most of which are better than the Kansas City Zoo because they have more animals .Considering that, I still enjoyed visiting the zoo. I don’t mind waiting in lines to go check out the animals and paying for the over-priced Dippin’ Dots. We may not have the best zoo, but it’s still one of my personal favorite places in Kansas City.
Multimedia by Brooklyn Terrill: