Jacksonville Zoo!

What a gorgeous day to spend at the zoo! I love school holidays and this MLK day was perfect for a fun family day! The weather waas beautiful (only a little too chilly in the morning), the girls were well behaved, it wasn't overly crowded - PERFECT!!!! Here are tons of pictures from our day...

Our first train ride of the day


We saw lots of animals from the train. The elephants were right at the fence. One of these elephants was donated by the Michael Jackson estate.

We got off the train at the back of the zoo to go check out the Australia and Asia exhibits.

Australia had some really pretty birds

Maryella wasn't too sure about it when one of them landed on my shoulder.

We all laughed at the kangaroo that was lounging in the sun.

They have a really neat kids area at the Jacksonville Zoo. The girls enjoy going through the "maze", but this time Annlee said it wasn't really that good of a maze. She's right, it's more of a winding path that the kids can run through.

But they all LOVE the ropes in front of the spider monkey exhibit. They are all part monkey, I tell ya!

Elianna had a wonderful first visit to the zoo. At first, it was pretty chilly and she was happy to stay bundled up in her buggy watching her sisters. She got into everything soon though.

In front of a manatee statue in the kiddie area.
The goats were a hit with Maryella, Annlee and Elianna. Kaylin hid out by the gate. Jeff had to go rescue her once when a goat walked into the area where she was. We suddenly realized we were hearing someone whimpering behind us and saw what was going on. I hated to laugh because she was really scared, but it was a little funny to see.

Elianna would grab fist fulls of goat hair and pull. Thank goodness they were tolerant goats. (In the background you can see Kaylin's yellow shirt where she's waiting by the gate, lol)

Kaylin looks at a jaguar sunning on a rock wall.

Kaylin has always loved the flamingos. All the girls were excited to see them.

A lemur A chimpanzee (or some sort of monkey)

Lots of monkeys - 4 in the background and 3 in the foreground, haha.

Outside one of the reptile buildings. There were 3 or 4 different buildings that had frogs, snakes, lizards, turtles, etc. I can't remember which reptiles were in which buildings, so they are all here together...

In front of some sort of lizard - it's on the branch behind Annlee

Annlee and another lizardI believe this is the anaconda

There are 2 green snakes in this exhibit. One is on the ground behind Maryella, the other is on the branch above Annlee's head.

I think this is an adder

Even Elianna enjoyed seeing the snakes. She would point to them and "talk" to them.

Don't know what it's called, but this green snake was pretty.

A geeko

A big ugly frog

Elianna thought it was lots of fun to sit on Jeff's shoulders.

Hmm, where should we go next?

How about the giraffes! I couldn't wait to go feed the giraffes!It was so neat to see them so up close! Such pretty animals!

Annlee and Maryella watched me at first, but them they both took turns feeding them.

Look at Annlee's mouth in this picture. Haha.

Elianna even took a turn feeding them! (Kaylin wouldn't do it, naturally)

At some point after lunch, Elianna fell asleep. We wore her out!

The next several animals were in the South America section. This is a red neck ostrich. Seriously, that's what it's called. Love it!

My what big ears you have!

Maryella sees a white tailed deer in the Wild Florida section.

We decided to take one more ride around the whole zoo before we left. Elianna had woken up by this time and wasn't in the happiest mood.

On more picture with a turtle statue in the parking lot before leaving to go home!