San Diego Zoo & San Diego Zoo Wildlife Park

San Diego Zoo

We visited San Diego Zoo in late December of 2022, our first time returning since 2009. A full day was just enough for us to see everything, but we easily could have spent longer.

The Wildlife Explorers Base Camp Children’s Area consisted of splash zone areas, climbing and balancing obstacles and animal exhibits. The nearby Cool Critters indoor exhibit was home to the trendiest of all amphibians, the Axolotl. It presented multiple options for kids to play freely as well as pockets of learning corners.

For lunch we dined at Albert’s, a full-service restaurant that was pretty upscale compared to those found in most zoos.

A double-decker tour bus covers much of the African and Australian sections of the zoo on a 35-minute narrated tour. The Sky Tram was also a convenient way to move between the eastern side of the park and the western Northern Frontier section on the outskirts of the Zoo.

Northern Frontier, San Diego Zoo, California, 2022

We spent most of the rest of the afternoon fairly confused trying to find our way through the Lost Forest to find primates and tigers.

San Diego Zoo safari Park

We visited San Diego Zoo Safari Park over the winter holiday break at the end of 2023. Because most local children were out of school many of the popular exhibits were crowded. With six hours we were still able to see all of the major attractions, leaving just as the guests arrived for the evening Wild Holidays celebration.

Food lines were exceptionally long all day at each of the counter service restaurants. There were multiple kiosks with snacks to supplement throughout the park and many guests had opted to bring in their own food.

Platypus!

The Walkabout Australia exhibits held arguably the most popular residents, the Platypuses. We waited in queue to enter the small building that replicated their stream habitat at night, when they are most active in the wild. We were encouraged to not linger too long to watch as they quickly swam in and out of view.

Two of the World Gardens were also a nice break from the crowds. The Bonsai display was extensive, with 20 different types of stunted trees and a California buckwheat plant believed to be more than 100 years old. I also diverted from the trodden path through the Baja Garden and Old World Succulent Garden. The pathway lead up to a covered overlook and displayed Southwest desert plants and south African succulents with signage to compare/contrast the euphorbia often incorrectly identified as cacti.

Safari Tram

The wait for the Africa Tram was nearly an hour in the late afternoon as guests tried to fit it in before the last trams left at 4:30pm. The 25-minute narrated tour moved quickly across the expansive African Plains section of the park, much of which is only viewable from the tour. Lions and other wildlife could be viewed on foot along the African Forest Trail, located near the tram entrance.