School holidays provide a great opportunity to take a weekday visit to Melbourne Zoo. Arriving just after opening time we headed straight for the Carnivore’s Trail, catching the lions still having a yawn:
A trip to Melbourne Zoo (4 Feb 2018)
With family visiting from overseas who absolutely love animals, especially cats, we naturally had to ensure a trip to one of the three Zoos Victoria sites. On her first visit to Australia, we took Jasminka to Healesville Sanctuary and so this time we arranged to have an afternoon at Melbourne Zoo with a couple of extra special encounters. We arranged to meet up a little over an hour before the first encounter so we could take Jasminka around to see some of her favourite animals.
Even though we were not meeting up until the early afternoon, we once again arrived early to Melbourne Zoo, eager to visit many of the wonderful animals, especially the big cats. Our first stop was to visit Binjai, the Sumatran tigress, on the Trail of the Elephants. Binjai was busy eating some grass and sniffing around her habitat, seemingly playing a game of hide-and-seek with visitors.
A trip to Melbourne Zoo (29 December 2017)
During the summer school holidays, Zoos Victoria opens the gates an hour earlier which gives visitors a great opportunity to see some of the preparations that keepers go through in getting things ready for the day and catching some of the animals going through their own morning routines. Naturally we arrived prior to the gates opening even for the early opening in the hope that we might catch the Snow Leopards out and about before the day warmed up too much. As such, our first stop was at their fantastic new enclosure on the Carnivore’s Trail.
Finding the doors to the night dens closed and the keepers busy cleaning, we wandered around a little further to visit Indrah, the female Sumatran Tiger, in her new home. Here we found Indrah pacing about a little as if she was trying to decide whether to go for a swim, go hide out the back or lie down on one of her many vantage points to survey her domain.
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A trip to Melbourne Zoo (23 December 2017)
Once again we headed into Melbourne Zoo in the hope of capturing some good photos on the new Carnivore’s Trail. As usual we arrived prior to the gates opening and queued up with other keen visitors. Once inside our first port of call was, naturally, to try and photograph the snow leopards. The animals, like us, are still getting used to the new enclosures and for some, including two of the snow leopards, still adjusting to smells, sights and sounds of Melbourne Zoo. Seeing little evidence of any movement in the snow leopard enclosure, we moved on with the intention of returning later in the day.
A little further down the trail is the fantastic new Sumatran Tiger enclosure. Here we eventually noticed Indrah hiding out in the back among the foliage showing how well she can camouflage herself.
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A trip to Melbourne Zoo (15 September 2017)
One of the best things about being a Zoos Victoria member is the fact that you can go in anytime without needing to buy a ticket for yourself. On this occasion we invited our good friend Chloe and her partner Alex to join us as both of them hadn’t been to any of the zoos in years. Unfortunately Alex had to be at work, but Chloe was able to make it. As an added bonus, we lent Chloe our Nikon D3200 to play with so she could experience the joy of photography with a real camera instead of using her phone.
Our first stop was to visit the lemurs as Chloe hadn’t seen the new Lemur Island. The lemurs, however, were still stirring from their slumber.
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