Lions, Tigers, and Bears, Oh My

Today, Drew and I spent 10 hours viewing animals spread over three different parks: the Singapore Zoo, Nighttime Safari which is a zoo for nocturnal animals, and the River Safari which is part aquarium part zoo. The amazing part was, there was always more to see. Not once did we get bored and think, "well, we have an hour to kill, what do we do now?" Between live shows, animal feeding etc, we saw a ton, and it was great. The Singapore Zoo is considered one of the best zoos in the world, and I totally believe it. There was way more jungle than concrete (which is not the case for American zoos), and often time the exhibits were "open," meaning we could walk through, or ride through on a tram, the different exhibits to really get an up close view of the animals. For instance, there was a squirrel monkey exhibit, where the monkeys were literally climbing on the fences next to you, running on the sidewalks so you had to make sure you didnt accidentally step on one... etc. One of them took a shine to Drew's wedding ring and tried to go after his hand a few times. I think Drew got a small monkey nibble in the process (no, it did not break skin, nothing to worry about). It was so cool to be that close to the animals. However, it was 90 degrees and humid all day, so, needless to say, Drew and I were a sweaty mess the whole time.

We saw several shows, including an Asian elephant show were the elephants did tricks as encouraged by their trainers, or mahouts. Apparently, elephants and their mahouts develop very deep bonds, and are often inseparable. These elephants were very clever, not only able to do tricks on command and show feats of strength, such as pulling around huge logs etc., but also able to participate in comedic acts like not getting up when the trainer would tell it to, demanding food for a trick, and so on. Very fun show.

We also went to the "Creatures of the Night" show which is the main show for the Night Safari. Basically. they would show us different nocturnal animals up close. The cutest guys were a pair of otters that were trained to separate out different types of recyclable materials, aluminum, plastic, and paper, and put them in the appropriate recycle bins.

Saw a tiger feeding and a lion feeding. At the lion feeding, there was an entire pride of Asian lions. Asian lions only live on this tiny little sliver in India, and apparently there are only 300 left of them in the wild, so this was very special. There were two males, which actually didn't eat anything during the feeding. maybe 3 moms, and 3 or 4 cubs fighting over the scraps the whole time. Very cool to see.

Most memorable animals:
1. Giant panda bear: Jia Jia, who was thoroughly concerned with eating his bamboo
2. Manatees! and cute, pudgy manatee babies.
3. The interactive squirrel monkey exhibit.
4. Asian lion pride
5. Raccoon, representing North America!
6. Interactive bat exhibit. Had 'flying foxes" which were the largest bats I've ever seen. Size of squirrels
7. Sleeping jaguar very close to the glass
8. Asian elephants
9. Baby joey in Kanga Roo's pouch
10. Kamodo Dragon

Enjoy all of the pics! Also, Leah, had a lavendar pudding with dinner that was pitch perfect.