Brookfield or Lincoln Park Zoo?

When I visited Chicago, I visited both zoos, so I can provide a last minute breakdown.

The Brookfield Zoo is, as you have heard, the bigger and (for the most part) superior zoo. However, the Lincoln Park Zoo still makes use of its limited space quite well, and apart from a few exhibits, it is far from mediocre.

The Lincoln Park Zoo is also incredibly convenient if you are looking in to seeing the majority of the city's attractions, as it's close to the Navy Pier (full of attractions), the Adler Planetarium (interesting if you're into astronomy), the Shedd Aquarium (home to many unique animals, like belugas, sea lions, dolphins, etc) and of course, the Field Museum (which any animal or dinosaur lover should hit), as they are all in extremely close proximity.

Both zoos offer several very nice exhibits, as well as animals that you can't see in many other zoos.

The one thing I will for sure recommend is to get a Go Chicago Card. It will allow free admission and line skipping for almost all of these attractions. It's pricey, but if you're going to try to see as much as you can, you should definitely pick one up. If not, it's probably not worth it.
 
We are going through the Magnificent Mile, the Navy Pier(any suggestions of what to do?), Museum of Natural History, and the Shedd Aquarium if the admission is cheap. Is it true that it is only $8?
 
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Moebelle said:
We are going through the Magnificent Mile, the Navy Pier(any suggestions of what to do?), Museum of Natural History, and the Shedd Aquarium if the admission is cheap. Is it true that it is only 8$?
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General Aquarium admission is not listed online or at the entrance however it is available when you simply ask for general admission 8 bucks.Its supposed to only get you the original aquarium upper level no Oceanarium but we have discovered that no one ever checks who is going where and have been getting free reign ofthe aquarium for 8 bucks for yrs now including just 3 weeks ago.By the way Field Museum is pretty awesome.

Team Tapir223
 
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TeamTapir223 said:
General Aquarium admission is not listed online or at the entrance however it is available when you simply ask for general admission 8 bucks.Its supposed to only get you the original aquarium upper level no Oceanarium but we have discovered that no one ever checks who is going where and have been getting free reign ofthe aquarium for 8 bucks for yrs now including just 3 weeks ago.By the way Field Museum is pretty awesome.

Team Tapir223
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Alright thank you. I just learned I have a choice between the aquarium and the museum. So which one should I choose? Does the museum really have animals? I saw on the map but I never looked into greater detail.
 
Moebelle said:
Alright thank you. I just learned I have a choice between the aquarium and the museum. So which one should I choose? Does the museum really have animals? I saw on the map but I never looked into greater detail.
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It depends. I'd say the aquarium is the must see, but if you're going on a weekend and time is an issue, then the Museum might be easier. I've seen 2 hour waits just to get into Shedd on nice summer weekends. I don't care how great it is. I'm not spending 2 hours waiting in line for anything.

The museum usually has a much shorter wait unless there's some major special exhibit on display. They had a King Tut exhibit once, and that's the only time I've seen a wait there that I wasn't willing to deal with.

And yes, the Museum has just about any animal you can imagine, they're just mounted behind glass. It might be a bit morbid, but you'll see hoofed stock species that will likely never be seen in US zoos again, even a few extinct ones. Their African wing is ridiculous. Literally any African megafauna you can think of is on display. They also have very extensive Asian and North American collections. You could spend three hours just looking at the mounted specimens.

I know that your trip is geared toward seeing animals, but you really can't go wrong with the Field Museum. IMO, the only museums in the US that come close are the American Museum of Natural History in New York and the Smithsonian Natural History Museum, and it may be better than both.
 
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I'm not on my computer so I'll make this short. The Brookfield Zoo was wonderful and it was like a whole new zoo experience for me. I expected Tropic World to be dreadful but now I don't understand why it gets criticized so much (besides the gorillas). I will post pictures on Thursday. I got many panoramas. In the Australia zone, is that exhibit filled with joeys western grey kangaroos, or Bennett's wallabies?

When we checked into the hotel, the guy at the front desk told us the Lincoln Park Zoo was a waste of time and we should simply should just not go. Now I can't decide if we should go to Lincoln Park or Shedd. I still don't know the admission to Shedd though so it depends.
 
Glad you enjoyed brookfield, it is a very under-rated zoo I think. People focus on the limitations of Tropic world and miss the fact the the rest of the zoo is very very very good. Shedd is expensive but worth it if you have time, with parking at lincoln park being outrageous its probably just as cheap too.
 
Moebelle said:
I'm not on my computer so I'll make this short. The Brookfield Zoo was wonderful and it was like a whole new zoo experience for me. I expected Tropic World to be dreadful but now I don't understand why it gets criticized so much (besides the gorillas). I will post pictures on Thursday. I got many panoramas. In the Australia zone, is that exhibit filled with joeys western grey kangaroos, or Bennett's wallabies?

When we checked into the hotel, the guy at the front desk told us the Lincoln Park Zoo was a waste of time and we should simply should just not go. Now I can't decide if we should go to Lincoln Park or Shedd. I still don't know the admission to Shedd though so it depends.
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The exhibit is filled with Bennett's wallabies, to answer that question.
 
The species in Tropic World Asia are northern treeshrew, white-cheeked gibbon, Bornean orangutan, and small-clawed otters. I am not certain what species of birds are in the exhibit. All the pachyderms in Tropic World moved to the pachyderm exhibits earlier this year.
 
So why does the zoo show a forest buffalo on the map? I'm guessing they would be in the second okapi exhibit?
 
The forest buffalo was formerly on exhibit next to the red river hogs. That exhibit is now home to yellow backed duiker.
 
Last question. Wasn't there a mangabey in the smaller exhibit next to the gorilla exhibit because now there is a silverback in there.
 
The exhibit next to the gorillas that now holds the silverback ramar, was empty for many years. The mangabey was on exhibit were the colobus monkeys and red-tailed guenon are now.
 
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