Lions and Tigers and...?

Frau Fahrtmann, our landlady, told us way back in March that we definitely needed to visit the Hannover Zoo. She said it is considered one of the best in Europe. Considering I lived in San Diego for 7 years and visited their zoo untold times, any other zoo had a lot to live up to, as far as I was concerned. Nonetheless, yesterday was my day to visit Hannover's zoo. To say it lived up to whatever wild expectations Frau wanted me to have is putting it a bit mildly.

But that's cheating a bit. No one can beat San Diego's canyons and ravines for the geographical setting of a zoo. Nor would I guess that Hannover could best them on the actual inhabitants enclosed. BUT Hannover is something quite unlike a zoo. Or maybe I should say MORE than a zoo. I've tried to put my finger on it and think it may be all the interactive stuff, like the cause-effect of a waterway system for a budding engineer, for instance.

And the whimsy all over the park. Why wouldn't a plane on expedition have to crash! Or a jeep have a flat tire and be stranded. Surely any safari would have it's campsite. A barnyard would have its tractor to climb on. The sheep would have hay wagons to rest under. And kids would have places to try out rope bridges and pretend-elephants to climb. And LOTS of playground equipment for all their energy!

Me? I was totally exhausted after 5 hours on my feet. I had a list of shows to go see but didn't get to one of them. In fact, I didn't realize till I got home that I totally missed the sea-lion and penguin section...and THE BEARS! How did that happen! So, yes, you'll see lions and tigers and NO BEARS in my album. (Oh my!) And all the prerequisite blokes, of course. It was fun to get some close-ups, practicing on my camera. Guess you had to be there!

AND! I did see two wolves (does the San Diego Zoo have wolves???) and made my priority of the day to see them fed at 1:30p. The black alpha male was okay but the white beta female, Akira, (who wouldn't get anywhere close to the male while he ate, waiting patiently for him to be gorged before she came near enough to be fed) totally stole my heart. Maybe that's what exhausted me because on that note I left for home. Haunted by the call of the wild!