2020 Vision : ZooBinh's Visual Personal Rankings and Reviews of 20 Zoos

[ZooBinh]

As we all know, the year was 2020, and I have looked back and realized that I've visited and have a memory of 20 zoos and aquaria (though I have visited 22 zoos and aquaria total). The coincidences lined up and I decided I would form what call my 2020 vision, which is a clear view in hindsight of my life, as 2020 has been a transformative year for me. I've decided to share some of that with you all. This thread is inspired by @aardvark250's thread here, and he has given me permission to use my idea and make one of my own.

Here's a list of the 20 collections to be featured here, in order of visitation:

Georgia Aquarium
Monterey Bay Aquarium
Columbus Zoo and Aquarium
Boonshoft Museum of Discovery
Virginia Safari Park
African Wildlife Safari
SeaWorld Orlando
Disney's Animal Kingdom
Cleveland Metroparks Zoo
Virginia Zoo
Gatorland
Newport Aquarium
Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden
John G. Shedd Aquarium
ZooWorld at Panama City Beach
The Florida Aquarium
Tampa's Lowry Park Zoo
Virginia Aquarium
Louisville Zoo
San Diego Zoo and Botanical Garden
San Diego Zoo Safari Park

A mention to the other two collections which I've no to minimal memory of:

Georgia Aquarium
Smithsonian's National Zoo

My next post in this thread will be the rankings of these 20 zoos, and I and I hope you all anticipate the coming posts.

Coincidentally, this is my 3000th post on ZooChat, and it's a huge milestone for me, a big reminder of a history of multitudes of posts I've made in the past that have not served a great purpose in the forum ! However, it's been an interesting ride, and I thank all of you who have made it enjoyable to me .

 

[ZooBinh]

The rankings are out!

I've tried as best I can to stay objective, and for the most part this is an objective list, but I did throw some of my personal biases into the mix, especially for things such as my home zoo. If you haven't picked up already, this is a list of my personal rankings, and if we were to rank objectively of what zoos were the best, there's a good chance that this would not be that list.

Without any further hesitation, here is my list:

1. Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden
2. San Diego Zoo Safari Park
3. John G. Shedd Aquarium
4. Monterey Bay Aquarium
5. San Diego Zoo
6. Columbus Zoo and Aquarium
7. Virginia Zoo
8. Cleveland Metroparks Zoo
9. Virginia Aquarium
10. Disney's Animal Kingdom
11. Seaworld Orlando
12. Newport Aquarium
13. The Florida Aquarium
14. ZooTampa at Lowry Park
15. Virginia Safari Park
16. African Wildlife Safari
17. Louisville Zoo
18. Gatorland
19. Boonshoft Museum of Discovery
20. ZooWorld at Panama City Beach

 

[ZooBinh]

To sum up what happened within the past what...8 months (?)....school happened. Better late then never I guess?

20. ZooWorld at Panama City Beach

To start off, this zoo was definitely not too impressive.

Photo taken by @OhSnapItsKirby

On my visit in 2016, the map was similar to the one above (taken in 2013), but with some differences (llama and a reptile house were listed on the map, as well as a nursery with various animals).

Photo taken by @okapikpr

This was the view for the part of the zoo I remember the most, the monkey and otter exhibits. Both were quite poor, the monkey exhibit being extremely overcrowded...and the otter exhibit being quite filthy.

Photo taken by @okapikpr

There's not much to say besides that there were a lot of these corn crib cages and rows of wired exhibits and aviaries scattered throughout.

The yard exhibits were mostly in this style, quite hard to navigate due to there being no path in parts of the zoo.

I would like to give some dishonorable mentions to the worst exhibits in the zoo: the big cat exhibits, giraffe exhibits, and the New Guinea Singing Dog exhibit. Other than that the rest of the enclosures were pretty bad to about decent...but nothing good...maybe besides the primate islands and the aviary.

https://floridapanhandle.com/panama-city-beach/things-to-do/zooworld-zoological-conservatory/

The link above will direct you to a collection of photos that make the park look much better than it is...and I used a few of them in this post.

To sum up this review though, this place was definitely not good at all, your typical roadside tourist trap, and probably not worth the time if you're ever in the area.

EDIT : It seems that the images from the link won't open? Anyways...they're in the link.