zookeeper for a day

I'm writing this post from our new laptop. On Monday there was a bit of an unfortunate mishap with our old "new" laptop (which we bought at Christmas). Let's just say that there was a glass of wine involved and that it cost more to fix that laptop than it did to buy this new one. I accept all responsibility. But don't start getting images of me having a few too many on a Monday night. Get that image out of your mind, because I'd only had one sip of one glass before I knocked the thing over. What a waste of wine.

Anyways, no laptop, no posts. But I wanted to share what we got up to on the weekend. For Jordan's birthday this year I went in with his mom and dad and got him a day at the Calgary Zoo spent behind the scenes with the zookeepers. Jordan loves animals, and our trip to South Africa was the highlight of both of our travels so far. It's a little expensive to go back there, and I don't think we will be going back any time soon...but a day in Africa at the zoo seemed doable, and almost (no, not really!) as awesome. I have to admit his initial response was not the ecstatic excitement I expected for this fabulous gift, but he eventually got there, and now after experiencing it thinks it was...

 

So, Saturday was the day this all went down. His day started early at 7 am with the Gorillas, where he fed the silverback a smoothie and helped clean up their enclosure. Then he fed the turtle, the lemurs, the bats (by hand), and helped build a nest for one of the birds in the rainforest. At this point, Westley and Jordan's mom and I joined in the fun, watching from afar and trying to get Westley to look at his Daddy in the enclosures instead of the fun and noisy kids running all around him (not easy!).

The best part for me was when he went over to the African exhibit with the Hippos. Somehow he mentioned my love of hippos to the zookeepers (we had seen one once in South Africa, and I screamed loudly in excitement and it immediately went underwater and never came back...I was so disappointed), and they offered for the three of us to go back and join them while they trained Sparky the hippo. Eek!!! I almost cried I was so happy. They let us feel inside her mouth, and the adorably soft spot behind her ear. Then the giraffe stalked over to see what we were doing and we got to feed the youngest giraffe some carrots (which he wouldn't eat) and bananas (which he loved). It all ended with Jordan helping the zookeepers to feed and distract the older giraffe Keri (sp?) while she was treated for an uncomfortable patch of dry skin. It was very cool to watch how patient the zookeepers were with her and they explained that they never make the animals do anything they don't want to do, everything is done on their time. Anyways, what started out as a gift for Jordan ended up being just a much fun for all of us and I'm so grateful to those awesome zookeepers!