Down Under Diaries: Surf Beach

Day 4 Tuesday January 17

After getting such good reactions from the girls at the Sydney Aquarium (see Day 5 of Sydney - 6 Days), we go looking for more animals to show them and head for the nearby zoo at Mogo. The zookeepers feed a Sumatran Tiger about 2 meters away from where I'm holding Rusty. They're feeding her a bucket of chicken necks one by one. The keeper holds one up high on the chain link fence and the tiger has to stand up and reach for it. Her paws are enormous and Rusty and I crane our necks to take in her full height. Sumatrans are the smallest of the world's six remaining species, but you wouldn't guess it from that view. The thought of a Siberian Tiger being up to 3x that size is hard to get my head around. Rusty holds on to me very tightly and stares very quietly - similar to her reaction to the shark. "Wowww," she says. Well said, I think.

Other big cats at Mogo are some White Lions, some African Lions, Snow Leopards from the Himalayas, and Servals which I had never heard of before, but which look a little like bobcats. Most of them are lying around in the shady bits of their big yards, but the Tiger and the African Lion put on good shows for us at feeding time.

We brought over our two-seater chariot stroller and are learning that there are good times to use it and bad times. Walking down the street to go grocery shopping is a good time. It glides over any curb or root or rock in its way and fits groceries for the trip home. The Mogo Zoo, with its narrow walkways and slow-moving crowds is a bad time. It's so bad it's almost funny. The chariot takes up most of the path that leads into the reptile house, so Ellen has to back out two or three times to let people out. She makes it to the corner, and a lady with a normal-sized umbrella stroller appears from the other side. Ellen gives her a look like, "um, would you mind backing up your tiny, non-ridiculous stroller, so I can get past with my gigantic, obnoxious one?" If Borat went to the zoo, he would have a stroller like this. We push it through a couple more exhibits, squeegeeing the crowds clear of the path as we go, before we can't take it anymore and I run it back to the car.

The primates are hilarious and fascinating. The zoo specializes in endangered species, so there are lots that I've never heard of. Rusty's not sure what's best to look at. "Oh!" she says and points at the Marmoset. "Oh!" she says and points to the lemurs who are pouncing all over their enclosure. "Oh!" she says and is toddles off towards the Golden Tamarins, who have such vivid colouring and wild hair-styling that we can barely believe they're real.

A pony-ride station and a petting zoo provide Rusty with some close encounters that have her wide-eyed and smiling. We get her to feed some little bambi-type deer from her hand and there is lots of yelling for "More! More!". It is all very exciting for her and by 1 o'clock she is putting her hands up to be carried. Five minutes after the car starts, both tots are asleep.