Day 225, Bangkok, Thailand
The Dusit Zoo was the perfect size, lots of shade covered walkways, deserted except a few school groups of teens. Like other zoos, they offered a few animal shows with the addition of a Kenyan acrobat show. Seemed a little odd, but there it was. The map was a bit cryptic, with stamps of animals placed besides the waterways. We searched for the camels exhibit which didn’t exist. Perhaps they just wanted to use up all the animal stamps when making the map.
Every zoo has different strengths. We saw a couple of hippos closer than we’ve ever seen.
This zoo has a raised boardwalk so you can see into the animal habitats from a different level. It was a great idea that we hadn’t seen used as extensively in any other zoo we’ve been to.
We saw Koalas, who were sleeping in trees but close enough that we could get a good look at them. There were white Bengal Tigers. There was an interesting nocturnal animal exhibit. The albino Barking Deer was a first for us.
The Koala family tree with names like Prong-Dong, Chiang-Muon, Nam-Ping, Wieng-Ping, and of course, Ken.
The monkey exhibit was two tiered, you could walk through the on the ground floor or higher on the second level where they were swinging around. It was a great feature and we spent a lot of time here. There was a particlar breed of monkey that had the most beautiful faces, the red-shanked Douc Langur (Pygathrix nemaeus), an endangered Asian colobine monkey found in southcentral Vietnam.
There was also a bomb shelter on with the grounds. I’m not sure what I expected on entering it, since I’d never been in one. But we shuffled through the tiny dark room and out the other side, I could see nothing. I can’t imagine huddling on one of those in fear for your life.
There are 7-11’s everywhere here, and the zoo is no exception. In the center of the zoo, as if you were in the city, there was a 7-11. We got snacks and small packages of toilet paper, in case you didn’t have the correct change to buy it in the bathrooms (like us). We tried some pickled mango, which no one could eat, but the rest of the snacks were good. The flavors of the Lays chips are unique, like Spicy Squid or Sushi.
We stayed until the zoo closed around five and took a tuk to the shopping district to do a bit more shopping and eat dinner.
Tuk ride
We’ve been to the Siam Paragon a few times and there are still new sections we haven’t been to every time we go.
We went to a restaurant with a salad bar, that was very interesting. There were many new and unrecognizable items. My plate looked like a little mosiac of nibblies, a tiny slice of baked Japanese pumpkin, tiny hardboiled eggs, some unfamiliar veggie goodies. Good way to try different foods.
Our taxi guy was great getting us home, metered, took the highway. It’s almost a bit surprising when someone does it by the books. Paul tipped him extremely well, he was so happy. We were happy, too, because we got home quickly which means Madi didn’t even get car sick from the usual long, scenic, traffic-filled routes that are normally taken. When we got home we had chocolate treats and the girls did some homework.