Summer Morning at the Sequoia Park Zoo

This week, we've enjoyed sunny, summery for us (~66 degrees!) weather and the kids have only half-day (PM) tennis camp this week so they (and Kelvin/I alternating) took mornings off to watch them.  Today, we took advantage of our Sequoia Zoo Membership and headed to Eureka to see the animals!

Iver wanted to take a picture with my phone of Every. Animal.! (He said I could delete them from my phone once I've blogged).

Northern Spotted Owl

Beautiful Bald Eagle

neighbor (slightly hidden) Porcupine

The three American Brown Bears are some of the park's hits. 

Caterpillar near the bears' enclosure

Bear viewed from the famous Redwood Skywalk.

Donkeys!

In the Barnyard: 

Ponies

Bunny

Guinea pig

Raccoon

Rhea

"Saffron"  the red panda, who loves to nap, got up to walk around on his branches.

Chacoan Peccaries

The Aviary

Scarlet ibis 

Patagonian Cavies

We saw some kids (including a couple of girls we know!) attending "Zoo Camp." 

Niall tried to photobomb or sabotage all the kid-with-flamingo pics we took.

A friendly guest offered to take a photo of us three and Niall cooperated/smiled!

We had a nice (1.5h) visit to our little redwood neighborhood zoo and want to keep supporting it!

Florida, Part 4: Gatorland and old friends!

We headed from South Florida to Orlando for the last part of our trip, which took us more than four hours with Miami area traffic.

We spent a nice afternoon at Gatorland, a lesser-known park in the area, and got to meet up with my college roomie and great friend Mindy, who just (about seven months ago) relocated back to the U.S. from South Africa with her family!  Mindy and I met at UR's music department in 1999 or 2000, over a quarter century ago and before cell phones were a thing! We have had some epic trips (hiking in Colorado in 2007 and  Peru/Bolivia in 2009). She was a bridesmaid in Kelvin and my wedding in 2011 and we stayed with her in Moscow in 2013). The last time we saw Mindy and Riaan was in 2020 in Washington, in D.C.-- oceans and child-rearing have often separated us but it was so great to reconnect in person, even though we live on opposite coasts!

Her boys (Xander [7], Jaxon [5] and Leo [2]) are a bit younger than ours but they had a great time together, seeing tons of reptiles, watching the nature shows, and riding the park train. 

Feeding chow!

Up Close and Personal show- the lady (Janelle) on the right did not want to hold the boa!

Niall pets the tarantula (I wanted nothing to do with that arachnid!).

We also watched a gator-wrangling show, where we learned even more survival tips in case you encounter a wild alligator (note: punch 'em in the nose. Running zig-zag is a myth)!

Kelvin had gotten us passes that allowed an up-close experience!

Gatorland has the largest collection of extremely rare white alligators in the world, including both albino (pink eyes) and leucistic (blue eyes) types in the White Gator Swamp. The other albino alligator I met, Claude, passed away after his time at the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco in December 2025.

Albino turtle! 

There was a croc section, which included some old favorites including the largest reptilian, saltwater crocodile, as well as some of the Nile variety.

Blondie

Mating (explained in part by the sign and also by the kid who recently completed "puberty ed" class)

The train! 

Petting zoo with some friendly mammals! 

Bobcat

Breeding grounds for birds and gators

Cockatoo

Our day ended with the Jumparoo, a show which had gators working for their raw chicken, jumping to pull it off a line or out of the employees' hands! 

We certainly had our fill of gators and relatives in a great sunny day in Orlando. More adventures are to come!