Submitted by: Jenkins
The Quest: The Chronicling of Creature Contact
The Challenge: San Diego Zoo Selfies!
I want you and the fair maiden to visit the SD Zoo, and take selfies (across the fence, of course) with an Okapi, Fennec Fox, and Hippo, if they have such animals, and a 4th animal of your choosing that reminds you of me. Remember: selfies; I should see one or both of you with the animals.
Tristan's Note: This is potentially the best quest ever. We didn't think that we would get to visit the zoo, and it is world renowned so that would such a shame. But this is the best!
Challenge Accepted!
Wombat's Ruling: This is too easy! Bah. Let's call this 200 exp, 3 hours charity (we've changed the rules, it's now 1 hour + 1 hour/100 exp, double what it was before).
Alright, here we go. We went to the zoo on Friday, June 22nd, getting there at around midday, this was later than we had planned because it only gave us 8 hours (!?) to look around and give it the attention it deserves.
We started out taking the gondola from near the entrance to the far end of the park, using it to scope out the lay of the land and make a plan for where we were going to go. The first thing that struck us was just how enormous the zoo is! It goes on for miles, and it is so well maintained, with every enclosure offering a pretty decent space for the animals. It also struck us just how much merchandise was getting sold, this place is a cash cow!
When we landed we took a walk to see the polar bears, which looked pretty sweaty on a 100 degree day, but were very cool, and one was rolling around scratching its back, which was pretty adorable.
We followed that up by heading towards the big cats and elephants. The cats were mostly sound asleep, the jaguar was awake and active though and put on quite a show for us! We got very lucky by visiting the elephants just as the oldest girl was going through her daily health checks. We got to see how respectful and professional their handlers were, and how majestic and intelligent Mary the elephant was. It was a really special experience.
We dawdled as much as possible, nerding out on the animals (apologies to the ones that I don't name check, there were many many). I can officially confirm that Zora is completing her descent into crazy bird lady status and spent as long in the aviaries as we did looking at the bigger mammals!
We saw giraffes and bears and orangutans and so many other things and it was wonderful. But most importantly here are your 4 requested selfies:
1: The Hippo
2: The Okapi
3: The Fennec Fox
4: Our choice for best representing Jenkins - The Mandrill! Now I know you are thinking that that is a strange choice, but hear us out. From far away they look kind of big and intimidating, but as you get closer you see that they are colorful both in their looks and their personalities, and beneath the big teeth and questionable hairstyle (not that you have that problem Jenkins) they spend quite a bit of their time being sweet to the other members of their group.
It's not the best series of selfies, but they are all there! We really had a fantastic day. Thank you so much for your generosity in purchasing the tickets for us, it is a memory that we will treasure for a very, very long time!
Quest complete Wombat?
Wombat's Judgement: Quest complete! Looks like a ton of fun! I also got to see them cleaning an elephant when I was there a few years ago, which was really cool.
