Walk-through Safari

One of the fun things we did while at the Coast was visiting the Walk-through Wildlife Safari. It was a sort of combination regular zoo/petting zoo. There were a lot of free-roaming pygmy goats, deer and llamas that you could feed (or rather, that would stalk you if they had the slightest suspicion you might be harboring some snacks!)

The biggest feature was that you could actually touch lots of the baby animals. Soren was able to pet a 5-month old black bear (they fed the bear a bottle and while he was gorging himself you could walk up behind him and pet him). We also got to hold a baby Lynx!

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Soren got to squeeze, er, I mean hold a ferret:

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...and pet a baby opussum:

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We also got to pet two skunks (including a blonde skunk, did you know there was such a thing?) and some sort of racoon relative who's name I forget now. It was an interesting experience.

But I have to say it brought on the usual conflicted zoo feelings. While it is so awesome to see these spectacular animals it is also sad to see them locked in cages rather than roaming free. What was the most surprising though was that even Soren picked up on it. He was particularly concerned about the chimpanzee. He watched him for a long time and then said "He's sad, Mom. He needs a friend."

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