Trip to the Zoo

On Friday, Micah had a daycare field trip to the zoo! It was his first trip to the zoo, but I was a bit hesitant about chaperoning. DH had a prior commitment and could not attend, and I was afraid the trip would be too much for me, especially on my own. Last minute, my father was able to re-arrange his schedule so that he could chaperone the trip, and I decided to go along, too.
My father showed up at our house bright and early at 9:00 am, and off to daycare we went. As a side note, my father showed up a bit dressed up for the trip to the zoo. He had on a beautiful blue button-down collar shirt. I took one look at him and suggested he might be too hot in the outfit. In typical fashion, my father insisted he would be fine. Knowing my father (who NEVER likes to dress down), I knew it was a losing battle, so I gave up on trying to convince him to change into a short-sleeved Under Armour golf shirt.

We were scheduled to leave for the zoo at 9:30, and left about 9:45 - not bad for daycare time. We took public transportation to the zoo - quite interesting taking our entire group on foot and down elevators and onto the trains. We had a few issues on the metro. First, we ended up with a wind tunnel as we were entering the station, and one of those "caution" signs caught air and took flight, charging 50 feet down the tunnel and nearly taking us all out. It was a bit scary! Luckily, no one was hurt. We complained to the station manager, who was completely uninterested in helping out.

Then, as we were loading onto the train, the train operator failed to follow procedure, and caught a few of us (me and "Grammy" - the older woman caretaker for Micah's class) in the train doors. We were quite scared, and it took several patrons to pull us inside to safety as the train started to move. The train operator did the same thing at every stop, so I decided to get the train number and file a complaint - that operator was quite dangerous. We reported him as we exited the station, and DH sent a follow-up note to his contacts.

The weather cooperated - it was bright and sunny, but possibly a bit on the hot side. My dad looked like he was roasting (not that he would admit it). He even rolled up his sleeves - a HIGHLY uncommon event! We began our descent around the zoo, stopping and looking for animals along the way. We saw a sloth bear early on, but a number of the animals were inside, and it was difficult for the children to see all of the animals from their strollers. We did see some cheetahs, and we tried to get a good look at some seals, but it was quite crowded. Micah seemed to enjoy the birds, but he started to get a bit restless as we wandered through the park. I was getting hot and thirsty, and my contractions were picking up. I took a bit of a break, drank some water, and sat down while my dad took Micah on with the group. I caught up to them a bit later.

We started to take them out to look when we saw the red pandas and elephants. Micah LOVED the elephants. My dad did a great job carrying and chasing after Micah - it was getting to be a bit too much walking and lifting for me. He needed a few breaks, too (his back was hurting a bit). What a pair we were! His back, my belly...perhaps we both should have skipped the field trip, but we were having fun.

We let the kids walk around a bit, and we then found a picnic area for lunch. While we were at lunch, the orangutans put on quite a show - they climbed out of their area and climbed across the ropes to the other side of the zoo. Micah was chasing them, pointing, clapping and loving them! He even said "monkey" a few times. Once again, my father spent the bulk of his time chasing Micah around the picnic area, and I was glad I had him along. Micah did not eat much for lunch at all - too much stuff to do instead.

Here is some video of the orangutans in action:

After lunch, we headed back home - I think we left the park around 1:00 or so. We arrived back at the daycare facility around 1:45, and then we said goodbye to Micah. I was exhausted after the trip, but it was a lovely day!

And for good measure, here is a video of Micah stomping around in his Daddy's slippers: