Lions and Tigers and Bears...Oh My!

It's been close to two weeks now since Paul and I took the girls to the National Zoo in DC. Paul and I love zoos pretty equally for different reasons. He sees zoos as a chance to get some really great photos (I think he's secretly hoping National Geographic will see one of his pictures on the world wide web and come calling) and I just love animals. Not all animals, mind you...just the warm-blooded, fuzzy ones and I have two little girls whose hearts melt along side mine into a puddle on the hot cement when one of those adorable little Prairie Dogs pops up and looks straight at you...although, I'm a sucker for Meerkats too.

It wasn't our first time at the National Zoo so when we arrived, we decided on which exhibits were the most vital for this particular visit and the one exhibit we knew we just couldn't leave without seeing was the elephants.

We meandered through the park a bit making our way toward the elephant arena in a roundabout fashion. We were able to see a male Lion (a first for me and for Paul). It seems every zoo we've ever been to has an abundance of female lions but no males. So this was pretty cool...


We saw a gorgeous Bengal Tiger...

A cuddly little Panda Bear waiting for lunch at the zookeepers door...

And a lot of other flora and fauna from all over the world...

Until we finally made it to the elephants! We got there just in time to watch them in action too. It seems we happened upon the beginning of their daily training session and Eva was so excited!

After about 10 minutes or so of watching the two ginormous elephants do all of their tricks, Paul and I could see that our trip to the zoo would have to come to an end. The eyelids were becoming a bit heavy, tempers were getting short and the emotional outburst were starting to rear their ugly heads...and the girls were tired too. So we waved good-bye to the elephants and began the long trek back to the van.

However, once we were only a few steps away from our beloved elephants, one little critter did protest.


It seems he just HAD to have his picture taken with some of his distant relatives.