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I did a calculation last Friday. In the last five weeks I have travelled approximately 34,000 kilometres across three continents and seven different countries, using almost every conceivable means of transportation, including: walking, bike, tram, train, car, plane, helicopter, theme-park ride, ferry, high-speed Zodiac, ship, dog-sled, horseback and canoe. Most of the places I'd been before, in my various "homes" in Europe and Canada, but there were two places that I'd never been before on these travels, Africa and Alaska. Therefore, it is ironic that today's much more limited travel will take me to those two places once again. Sort of. Today's travels take us to the Zoom Erlebniswelt in Gelsenkirchen, Germany ( www.zoom-erlebniswelt.de ). This particular zoo is a very nice modern zoo built on the site of an older zoo. It is currently still being built but when it is complete it will feature animals from three major areas of the world: Alaska, Africa and Asia. The Asia part is still all under construction and therefore not accessible, but the other two are nearly finished, so today I shall visit Alaska and Africa once again! Alaska First we shall visit Alaska. The Tlingit Portal will lead us there. It's weird to see this Pacific Coast artwork and totem poles again. I thought I left this stuff behind me last week. Although I have to say that the doesn't quite look right somehow. Not quite authentic.  The first stop of the day is at the Mooses. Well, actually, the mooses are the last stop of the Alaska area, but we wanted to see them first so we snuck in the exit to see them first. You see, this zoo employs my favourite method of museum/zoo layout with a completely linear walking route - you start at the start and you walk to the finish and you see everything because all there is to see is laid out along a single path. I love it when museums and zoos and whatever else use this kind of layout because it eliminates having to plan one's route to ensure that you see everything.  The so-called "King of the Forest" is not up to much today.  His Moose girlfriend is having a snack, however.  Moose like eating bark. Imagine how simple a diet that must be.   Still eating.  Still sitting around.     That's about enough of the Mooses for now, I think.  Going back through the Tlingit Portal, this time in the entrance along with everyone else, brings us first to the Lynx. You will see that this zoo is really an extraordinary zoo and if you take a look at the bottom of this photo you will see one example of why. The people standing by the window have their dog with them. I have never heard of a zoo allowing dogs inside. You'd think that would be weird, what with all the dangerous wild animals around, but there it is all the same. The dog is very excited at the site of a cat on the opposite side of the glass. The "cat" is equally interested in the dog on the other side, just like any normal cat would be when its safe behind glass, except that in this case the "cat" in question would shred this dog to pieces in about two seconds flat if he were to try and do some chasing around.  Another Lynx relaxes nearby.  The Lynx eyes the dog on the other side of the glass.  This Lynx acts like a normal cat in other ways as well, including pawing at the glass nervously like with obsessive-compulsive disorder.  Next stop: Snowy Owls.  I think Owls are pretentious. So smug. They think they're so great.  Racoons, on the other hand, I like. I've never had to live next to them in my life and have them take my garbage apart, so I can admire their advanced skills with their hands.  Looks like this guy has had too much garbage to eat.     Racoons just look really intelligent somehow.  Which brings us to the Beavers. Beavers are another animal that likes to eat bark.  Beavers are also very fond of water. Who else would sit in the water chewing a stick when they could stand on dry land doing the same thing?  I am not sure how to feel about skunks. They aren't particularly cute. And they always hang around the entrance to the school just down the street from me, where the teenage kids always hang out. I don't see them there, but I can smell them.  This abandoned bus is another example of the specialness of this zoo. To see the skunks you can climb in the bus and look out of the side windows. The animal viewing areas in this zoo are not only carefully thought out, but they go to some trouble to make things feel really natural, as though you're out in the wild taking a walk and just happen to come across an old abandoned bus.  I am not sure what the skunks are doing. They are just digging around looking for bugs, I guess.  A short walk from the skunks brings us to a old time gold rush miner's camp. In the distance we can see some storefronts of an old Alaskan town.  This is funny. I actually WAS in Skagway a week ago. The real one, in Alaska.  Down below some people are trying their hand at panning for gold.  Across the marsh are the storefronts of the pretend Skagway.  This is yet another example of how cool this zoo is. They don't just have animals on display, but have cool scenery built up and related activities along the way as well.  Alaska, of course, was home to several gold rushes of its own, as well as being the gateway to the Canadian gold rush in the Klondike.  Let's head for the Alaska Diner for some authentic Alaskan Bratwürst, shall we?  After lunch, continuing along and looking back across the lake at the outskirts of pretend Skagway.  This is a little baby Reindeer. He was a bit spastic somehow, and kept twitching like he was itchy all over.  A river runs through the Alaska part of the zoo and thanks to clever design passes through all the animal areas. The marsh outside the pretend Skagway acts as a natural filter for the water.  This is an Arctic Fox. He wasn't doing much so this was the best picture I could get.  These are Kodiak Bears, so named as they come from an Island on the coast of Alaska called Kodiak. In truth, however, they are just Brown Bears. Just like Brown Bears and Grizzly Bears are genetically the same species, so are the Kodiak Bears as well. They just differ in behaviour due to where they come from and live.  An authentic Alaskan rope bridge.  An authentic Alaskan waterfall.    Bears are always the least interesting animals in any zoo. I don't even know why they bother getting them. They just lie around all day. They should throw some Salmon into the river and make the bears go fishing for their food.  An exhibit shows the life of the Eskimo, an abandoned skeleton of a boat and the bones of a whale nearby. (All pretend, of course. No whales were harmed to make this exhibit.)   I was just saying recently how Sea Lions are much better to view in the wild because in a zoo they don't even notice you there to visit them, whereas in the wild they always eye you suspiciously as you pass by them.  A special feature of the Sea Lion area is the underwater glass tunnel where you can watch the Sea Lions swimming overhead.    Notice the guy holding his kid up to see. Why bother? The kid won't even remember this when he's older. What a waste of time to bring kids along to places like zoos.  And now for the part that everyone has apparently been looking forward to - the Polar Bears. Everyone crowds around one window to watch the Polar Bear on the other side of the glass.  Polar Bears are the exception to the rule of thumb that bears are boring. Polar Bears are more active. Polar Bears in zoos, however - in my experience, are kind of half-crazed and pace around a lot. These Polar Bears seem quite pleased with themselves and don't act crazy.    All bears are good swimmers, but Polar Bears seem to be the ones who like the water the most.   The other Polar Bear is not so interested in going in the water though.  The sun is too bright for the Polar Bear, I think.  The one on the right sneaks up on the other one.  I think he wants the other one to come into the water too.    The Polar Bears walk around for a while before both jumping into the water.   Hey! They are swimming over toward us!    Little known is how good of swimmers and divers Polar Bears are. This skill enables them to more effectively eat cute little seals, I guess.  The Polar Bear as seen underwater.  Polar Bears are pretty cute, I think.  In the enclosure right next door there is another Polar Bear having a nap in the sun.  An action photo of the Polar Bear shaking himself dry.     The Polar Bears play in the water together.  Next door the other Polar Bear continues his nap.  Moving along again takes us through the Alaska Ice Adventure and then out onto the streets of pretend Skagway. I'll have to rely on the description from the website for the Ice Adventure because it was too dark and moving around too much to take any pictures. Go on a breathtaking journey through the Arctic Ocean on an ice floe. Experience the elements from close by: you drift on the open ocean, enclosed in the moist cold polar mists. Thunder rolls in the far distance, announcing a thunderstorm which is approaching. Orca whales appear next to the ice floe and blow air out of their breathing holes like an explosion. Admire the powerful body of the orca, up to 9 metres in length and 10 tons in weight - made for hunting! The seals speedily flee from the whales between the jagged ice floes. But look! watch out! Up ahead, a ship is coming straight on line for you!  Another of my favourite animals, the otter. This Alaska part has many of my favourite animals in it.   Otters are a proud and clever race of animal, hunted to near extinction by stupid morons. If only they could have applied their cleverness to doing evil things to those that hunted them.  Less easy to spot are the Timber Wolves, who are hanging out in a corner of their area, far from human eyes.  And with that we come full circle and to the end of the Alaska part of the zoo, and back to the Mooses once again. Africa Which brings us to part two of today's zoo experience: Africa.  Needless to say this is nothing like the Africa that I am familiar with. I don't see a single crappy corrugated tin shack anywhere.  Another of the more boring zoo animals, the Lion.  Yawn. You got that right.  I bet if we let the Lions in this part they wouldn't be half as boring.   I am not sure why Porcupines are considered African. Maybe these are African Porcupines?  And Ostrich. I never understood the appeal of these animals, except to make burgers out of them.  Down below is the African Queen river boat ride. Let's go do that!  I'd like to say that the Pepsi ad is not authentically African, but it actually is. Or, more accurately it would be authentic if it didn't look so nice and was hand-drawn crappily.  Off we go down the river and past Monkey Island.  And into a cave with a waterfall in it. Some kid was screaming in fear when his boat went through this tunnel. Once again, what a waste of time bringing children to the zoo.  This has nothing to do with the zoo. I just liked the way the rays of sun were streaming from the clouds.  Moving along once again brings us to some ratty little animals that I forget the name of.  And finally we arrive at the Hippos. Zoos rarely have proper full-sized Hippos and try to pass off those crappy pygmy Hippos instead. I am glad to report that this zoo does, in fact, have proper full-size Hippos.  Hippos are funny. They just kind of stand around in the water all day.  Then again, who knows what they're doing underneath the water. It could be anything, for all we know.  It's difficult to know how many Hippos there are since they come up for air and then dive under the water again right away. I am surprised to see that there are a total of four of them when they all come to the surface at once. I had estimated that there was only three of them.  Which brings us to the end of the zoo day. I ran out of the Chimpanzee hall when one of them got mad and I got scared, knowing what I know about Chimps killing people in Sierra Leone. And so the day ends here, with a visit to these things that I don't even know what they are. How incredibly anti-climatic. |
