Another day at Seoul Zoo

After our last trip to the zoo, when we melted in the summer heat, we decided to hit it up again while it was still pretty cool outside in order to see the rest of the complex. We also decided (Michael decided) that we would try out the Sky Lift. 

We took the shorter ride, along the blue route seen here:

 It was a very nice ride, but it felt just a tad precarious...no restraints, other than an unlocked cage bar. There was a mighty nice looking safety net along the entire course with the occasional hat, blanket, or toy stuck in it. Thankfully, we were the only passengers at that early hour, so no one could be annoyed by my constant reminders for the boy to "sit still", "sit back", "don't lean that way"...I think I aged 5 years that day.

We saw the petting zoo and farm animals; look - sheep! 

We also got a great view of the botanical gardens.

This is his triumphant "We did it!" face:

We then wandered along the red line course of the Seoul Grand Park Zoo, through the African exhibits, visiting the flamingos, giraffes, and rhinos along the way.

We saw some interesting art as we went:

This was his "monkey face"...a tired one??

We spied a building in the woods and decided to check it out - the Insectarium!

There were a ton of pinned displays of various types of preserved creepy crawlies.

There were a bunch of displays with live little critters, as well - like this tank of water beetles:

Ewwww...

Double ewwww...

The outdoor section had some amphibians in addition to bugs.

We then ventured back outside to find the elephants - score!

The playground was nearby, so we had to take a quick pit stop to play. We may have had a bit too much fun with our photo taking shenanigans...

Run, Michael, run!

Hold on!!

 

Hello, Mr. Rhino.

Then, since we learned from our first trip that this is a ginormous place, we hopped on the free in-park shuttle bus to go see some crocodiles.

Unfortunately, we did not stay there very long, as these monkeys were being SO LOUD! 

I cannot even begin to describe how loud they were...but I'll try. It was like a chorus of car alarms, air raid sirens, and fire department alarms all going off at the same time. I think the rest of the animals in the enclosure had gone deaf at this point. I managed to catch a short clip of it here, but it was in no way the full example. They were so LOUD!

We escaped, I mean left, that building and headed over to see the seals. I heard the sounds of a show going on inside the pavilion and we quickly ran in to find...

...dolphins!

At some point between last summer (when I had read that the previous dolphins had been released after protests) and now, the zoo re-started the Dolphin Encounters show.

Someone was very happy about this!

This made his day and it was hard to get hime to move on...which was finally accomplished with a promise to come back for the next show at 13:30.

First we stopped for lunch at the adjoining cafe - I had a tasty pork cutlet.

We wandered through the deer exhibit:

Saw some pigs...

...and some feisty anteaters...

...and finally found a croc in a more peaceful setting.

These cool looking totem poles are near the large bird of prey cages:

At this point, we had a snack and then headed back to the Dolphin show...which also had seals! We missed them the first time around.

Here are a few clips of the dolphins showing off their tricks. If you listen carefully, you can hear someone's excited commentary in the background (and I mean Michael's, not mine!):

As we were getting ready to leave, the zoo went into lockdown for the regularly scheduled emergency drill held throughout the city...so we found the nearest shelter at the gift shop and amused ourselves with some photo booth fun.  :)