Lions, Tigers and Penguins... Oh Yeah!!!

We have now been living overseas for two whole weeks and feel like we have contributed to the local economy immensely. We've rented an apartment, drank the local liquor stores dry, eaten everything in sight, and tried to be as touristy as possible. Yesterday was no exception. We decided to hit up the Auckland Museum followed by the Auckland Zoo.
The weather yesterday was some of the best we've had. It was 20 - 22 degrees with clear skies, we started the day by slathering on sunscreen and planning our attack.

First up was the Auckland Museum.

The Museum was awesome, it is filled with heaps of local Maori stuff as well as a war memorial and an floor of taxidermy, volcanoes and dino stuff. We toured around there for a couple hours then grabbed a taxi to the Zoo.

The Zoo is modern and, other than some uncooperative Giraffe's, the animals were accessible and pretty easy to get some shots of.

The first shot is of the most dangerous animal there... Jess.

Up next: Cock two ways

The rooster refused to answer why he was crossing the road.

The big cats were super lazy and basically just laid around.

The battle of the big beasts was won by the Hippos, we caught them at feeding time and the actually chomped like "Hungry Hippos". Is was crazy to see them swimming around and then lumber out of the water.

After they stuffed their faces with hay they washed it down with some hose water.

The Rhino was sleeping when we first got to his enclosure, he then got up and mooned us... Cheeky Rhino!

On the topic  of butts these guys had the most interesting. There was a baby baboon that kept trying to get into trouble so his mom would just hang on to his tail.

The Blue Penguins are little Nerf ball sized birds that primarily huddled in the shade. When they decided to go for a swim they ran for the water like border jumpers escaping Mexico.

The Zebra would truck around their enclosure aimlessly but stayed in formation for most of it. They favoured the "Flying V" from the "Mighty Ducks" movies.

Our favourite animals were the Monkeys. They could have provided entertainment for hours. They would huddle up and be friendly one second then freak out and start swinging around like maniacs. They are kept in their enclosure with a moat and showed true fear of water. It took a full apple for a couple of brave ones to wade out for the prize.

We enjoyed the Museum and Zoo and can only hope that the rest of Auckland is as exciting and entertaining.