Now for the rest of the weekend. Sunday we got up early so that we could hop in the car and drive down to the San Francisco zoo to get there right when they opened. The reasons for going were to attend the Woo at the Zoo event, but that started at noon, so we figured if we got there right when it opened, we’d have two good hours to wander around and at least see some of our favorite critters while there was still a chance they were out and about.

Turns out going down early was a good idea in a lot of ways. Normally when we get there right when the zoo opens, there’s not much of a crowd, and it doesn’t really get crowded until later in the day. However, on Sunday, along with the Woo at the Zoo event, there was some big Year of the Rat celebration, which meant that by the time we got there, just a few minutes after they opened, the parking lot was nearly full. We still had no problem finding a place to park, but the Woo event actually had to start late because so many of the attendees were unable to park in the lot and had to park along the road outside the zoo and hike a good distance back.

Parking, aside, it was also good we got there early because all of our favorite critters were, indeed, out and about. The lemurs were pretty much all visible. Granted, a majority of them were curled up in tiny little lemur-piles, snoozing, but they were at least out in the open, and a few of them were wandering about, nibbling on leaves or bouncing around high up in the trees, or poking at each other and playing ‘King of the Hill’ on various perches. Quite cute. The river otters were both out, cavorting around on the rocks and in the water. The penguins were swimming in circles at one end of their enclosure. And most of the Africa exhibit animals were out and visible, some even wandering around a bit. By the time the Woo event was over, three hours later, there wasn’t a lemur or a river otter to be seen, and many of the rest of the animals were all curled up in hiding, staying out of sight.

So the Woo at the Zoo thing. A better name for it would be ‘How any critter you can think of has sex.’ Heh. They provided a rather tasty brunch, and while we ate, we listened to a three hour lecture on the mating habits of all manner of critters – from bugs to birds to mammals large and small. And it was wonderful. The woman who gives the lecture has been doing this for years, and she was hysterical. There was no mincing of words here, she had us all laughing, blushing, or cringing the whole time. She would even occasionally act out some particularly amusing bit. When she talked about some of the smaller animals another zoo employee would walk in carrying on of them, and during the dessert break, we all got a chance to ‘meet’ a few of those (hedgehog, a few birds, a large black millipede, a cute little armadillo, a lovely little snake).

It was definitely a lot of fun – very entertaining, plus we got free admission to the zoo, and took advantage of being there to renew our membership and ‘adopt’ one animal each. Richard adopted a Magellan penguin, and I, naturally, adopted a lemur.

We wandered around the zoo for a little bit longer after the talk was over, but as I noted, by then everyone was tucked away, sleeping the day away. So back we drove toward home, with a brief detour for dinner along the way.