Snowleopard's 2018 Road Trip

I think his moniker on this website should be CanadianKea because he's so obsessed with visiting new zoos :P !
 
sooty mangabey said:
He’s a deeply troubled individual. It’s the only possible explanation.
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Claims the man with 380 different zoos under his belt. Is that your most recent, updated total? I know that I finally passed you, which offers me a slight measure of pride, although I'm sure that you are already scoping out the cruddy, home-made zoos of some godforsaken backwater at this exact moment in time.
 
snowleopard said:
Because they are there. - that would be my simple answer. :)

I've been obsessed with zoos and aquariums for as long as I can remember, often constructing elaborate zoos in my bedroom as a youngster with 700 plastic animals (which I still own). I will go to just about any zoological facility once, as there are gems to be found at most of them. Even the junky Special Memories Zoo in Wisconsin, with its 75-year-old owner, has 15 primate species and 4 types of macaque. Where else can you see that in America? Probably nowhere.

A lot of it is a numbers game, with at least 10 people that I know with 400+ zoos under their belt and there are probably more individuals than that with as many different zoos visited. Jonas Livet, that globe-trotting Frenchman, is probably at 1,400 as I type this! I want to see loads of zoos, to photograph the signs, exhibits and document their existence. It's a passion, obsession and hobby all rolled up into one glorious adventure. Quite often it is not even about the animals but more about the type of exhibits, design and history.
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I think these words would be true for many here.... While I’d rather revisit a good zoo, knowing there’s a collection of animals nearby that I’ve not visited causes me genuine pain. Next week I’ll be spending a day in Granada. Not being able to visit the Alhambra, one of the finest examples of European civilisation, bothers me not a jot. Missing out on the small tropical houses which is part of the science museum gnaws at my innards....

snowleopard said:
Claims the man with 380 different zoos under his belt. Is that your most recent, updated total? I know that I finally passed you, which offers me a slight measure of pride, although I'm sure that you are already scoping out the cruddy, home-made zoos of some godforsaken backwater at this exact moment in time.
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Erm, yes - guilty as charged. Although, as of today, it’s 389. And at none of them did I have to sit on a small train while being attacked by mosquitoes...
 
sooty mangabey said:
I think these words would be true for many here.... While I’d rather revisit a good zoo, knowing there’s a collection of animals nearby that I’ve not visited causes me genuine pain. Next week I’ll be spending a day in Granada. Not being able to visit the Alhambra, one of the finest examples of European civilisation, bothers me not a jot. Missing out on the small tropical houses which is part of the science museum gnaws at my innards....
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You know what causes me physical pain? Reading this paragraph. :( The Alhambra is a true gem.
 
I was walking outside today and thinking about what it would be like to have visited 400+ zoos in my life. Snowleopard must have an incredible accumulation of knowledge and experiences of zoological facilities to draw from and think about. I was reminded of a passage from A Game of Thrones by George R R Martin: "a mind needs books as a sword needs a whetstone, if it is to keep its edge. That is why I read so much". Perhaps a zoo fan needs an encyclopedic knowledge of zoos, if it is to keep stimulated. That is why they visit so many zoos.

Personally, I am not interested in visiting 400+ zoos, but I can see some of the appeal.
 
snowleopard said:
Zoo #45:

Another 45 minutes west and I came to the Special Memories Zoo (Greenville, WI) and yet again I have another story about an eccentric owner but I'll save the juicy stuff for another paragraph. This place is the same wood-and-wire, chain-link crap that has plagued many of these privately-owned Wisconsin menageries. In terms of rare taxa it is a delight as there are surprises around every corner. With zero maps handed out, I spent some time backtracking and wandering around in order to ensure that I saw each and every exhibit and after 2 hours in the zoo I located an enclosure by the exit that ended up being the only one that I had missed. I wandered over to take a peek and sure enough, there was a Geoffrey's Cat inside! That species is practically extinct in American zoos these days, but then just check out this list of primates at the zoo:

Primates (15 species): Hamadryas Baboon, Olive Baboon, Crab-eating Macaque, Sulawesi Crested Macaque, Japanese Macaque, Rhesus Macaque, Vervet Monkey, Common Squirrel Monkey, Black-handed Spider Monkey, Patas Monkey, Tufted Capuchin, White-throated Capuchin, Common Marmoset, Red Ruffed Lemur and Ring-tailed Lemur.

All of those primates can be seen 5 feet away, which is the USDA's (U.S. Department of Agriculture) ruling and I heard that from two owners on this trip. Both Animal Haven Zoo and Special Memories Zoo have winding pathways that are 5-6 feet away from every single cage. It is almost close enough for a very tall individual to reach over and pet a macaque! Seeing the Sulawesi Crested Macaques was the highlight because those guys are barely found anywhere.

Special Memories Zoo actually took me a full 2 hours to tour and once again I was subjected to one of those damn kiddie train rides. This particular journey was much more enjoyable than the mosquito-ravaged, rain-soaked, bumpy-as-hell jaunt at Animal Gardens Petting Zoo a couple of days ago. This time around, at Special Memories Zoo, the ride was a 30-minute experience that took visitors past a series of cages containing indigenous animals. The really extraordinary thing was that the lady driving the train would blow the train's whistle to wake up the animals and then haul some out to show off to visitors. She picked up a Red Fox that was only a few months old (but still quite large) and the fox just laid there half-asleep. The lady spoke in a microphone and walked along the length of the train giving everyone a close-up opportunity with the fox and then she deposited it back into its corn crib cage. She showed us Grey Wolves, White-tailed Deer, Fishers (always pacing in captivity), a Striped Skunk, Woodchucks, etc. The guide went into a small cage with at least 5 North American Porcupines and she pulled the youngest one out and walked up and down again showing us the animal. She also opened the door to the American Badger 'pen' and grabbed a younger one to show everyone as it licked her and she kissed its face. An interesting train ride and it only cost me $3 and once again I sat in the caboose. “Zoo nerds go to the back!”

Besides that impressive primate collection (unfortuantely every single species was to be found in junky cages) and the train ride to see Wisconsin wildlife, this zoo has lions, tigers, bears, a giraffe, zebras, camels and a loop with nothing but bird exhibits. One aviary is truly enormous, towering over everything in the park. The owner is right there at the cash register as soon as you walk into the zoo, and she is probably 75 years old and she had the TV cranked up full blast the entire time I was there. A 7-week old Patas Monkey was jumping around behind her and the entrance building is absolutely stuffed with odds n' ends in all directions. It seriously looks as if you've stumbled into someone's overcrowded garage and yet she has a freaking Geoffrey's Cat right around the corner. These small zoos are genuinely surreal to tour. We're yelling back and forth because the damn TV is so loud and the baby Patas Monkey is chattering away and the zoo owner is half deaf and I'm inwardly shaking my head. One more zoo on the bucket list and I'll move on, lady.

She asked where I was from and I told her that I was on a big Michigan/Wisconsin road trip and she'd heard of basically none of the Michigan zoos but she was a bit sharper than other local zoo owners and she had visited many of the Wisconsin zoos...25+ years ago! She kept asking me what advice I had for her and I was critical of the American Black Bear and Grizzly Bear exhibits as they are disgusting cement blocks. Well, that did it! She raised her voice to drown out the blaring television and let me know in no uncertain terms that in zoos with big grassy enclosures there are bears dying all the time from bacteria and viruses that seep through the ground. She became so animated that she made it seem as if a couple of bears had just died while we were having our conversation! All of those nasty pieces of bacteria, right? She said her veterinary officer and even the USDA officer advised her to not move the bears as concrete is easier to clean and it doesn't maintain germs. Take a look at the photo link and you faithful readers can decide if the exhibit is large or appropriate enough for the two bears that live in it.

American Black Bear Exhibit:

American Black Bear Exhibit | ZooChat

After she calmed down a little, I steered the conversation towards her remarkable primate collection and she beamed with pride. These ancient owners, many of them all very old, are so delusional and out of touch with reality that I just have to nod my head and smile at their behaviour. They are from an era when it was okay to have monkeys running around in entrance buildings, or bears on cement, or tigers in exhibits that are only twice as wide as the cat, etc. The crazy thing is that these owners have not been to another zoo for a quarter of a century and it's as if they are stuck in some weird Austin Powers time loop in history. Maybe we'll pile all of these oddball zoo owners into “The Zoo That Shagged Me: The Cement Sequel.”
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A Geoffroy's Cat!? The zoo keeps two.
 
snowleopard said:
Because they are there. - that would be my simple answer. :)

I've been obsessed with zoos and aquariums for as long as I can remember, often constructing elaborate zoos in my bedroom as a youngster with 700 plastic animals (which I still own). I will go to just about any zoological facility once, as there are gems to be found at most of them. Even the junky Special Memories Zoo in Wisconsin, with its 75-year-old owner, has 15 primate species and 4 types of macaque. Where else can you see that in America? Probably nowhere.

A lot of it is a numbers game, with at least 10 people that I know with 400+ zoos under their belt and there are probably more individuals than that with as many different zoos visited. Jonas Livet, that globe-trotting Frenchman, is probably at 1,400 as I type this! I want to see loads of zoos, to photograph the signs, exhibits and document their existence. It's a passion, obsession and hobby all rolled up into one glorious adventure. Quite often it is not even about the animals but more about the type of exhibits, design and history.
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I guess my question (and it’s a genuine one, not a leading question) is what you are really getting out of these visits. 15 primate species is a lot for a small zoo, but wouldn’t be all that noteworthy in an established urban zoo.

You certainly don’t seem to have enjoyed at least a significant chunk of your stops on this year’s road trip. And as a further observation - it seems to be the more credentialed zoos that you had visited on earlier trips that you’ve written about in more detail and perhaps found more fascinating?

As an aside, I remember a long, long time ago when you used to question the merits of the ‘wood and wire’ zoos in the UK, which perhaps feature more prominently on Zoochat than they otherwise would because of our heavy UK presence. You’ve now been to an awful lot of US zoos with standards at or below the same level: I wonder what your thoughts on such zoos are now?
 
snowleopard said:
...I almost hit 1,400 km (870 miles) and I only stopped twice in about 12 hours... An absolutely mammoth day of driving and I just know that the Euro zoo nerds are shaking their heads as they read this...
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Oh it's not just the Euro zoo fans, trust me. I am an American and I think you're nuts too. I mean really, I love you as a friend, but there is nothing the least bit desirable about your adventure, especially driving twelve hours. Whenever I drive six hours home from San Diego I swear I will never do it again!

I have been to over 100 zoos, but there are some in my own state that you have seen and I have not (and likely never will).

I used to like U2 Joshua Tree and Rattle and Hum, but am not into them at all any more. However I did see the film version of Rattle and Hum at the famous Chinese Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard. (I mention this only because Snowleopard is also a movie fanatic).
 
snowleopard said:
DAY 11: Sunday, July 22nd

Another 6 small Wisconsin zoos today:

Zoo #36:

About half an hour south of Milwaukee is this abomination of a zoo that goes by the name of Jo-Don Farm & Zoo (Franksville, WI). I walked in with nobody in sight and saw the entire zoo in about 14 minutes flat. Then a staff member apologized for the fact that some employees recently quit and he was therefore running solo and I handed over my $5 admission fee. There are a couple of tigers, a mammoth male lion, a cougar, a wolf, and my daily fix of African Crested Porcupines, Ring-tailed Lemurs Maras, Dromedaries, Llamas, Coatis and various waterfowl and a few reptiles. That is basically the entire zoo, other than domestics, and I went around a second time and spent maybe 25 minutes in this dump that is out in the countryside on a working farm. The highlight was seeing a Red Fox, an Arctic Fox and a Gray Fox all in the same enclosure. It is obviously zoologically ridiculous but also very interesting to compare the pelts of all three at once. The worst cage award goes to the Cougar exhibit as it is perhaps 18 feet wide and 18 feet deep...this dump is an ugly plague on the world of zoos.

Zoo #37:

About 30 minutes east is yet another zoo that is on private property and has next to zero advertising signs. Bear Den Zoo (Waterford, WI) has been around a long time and it shows as there are corn crib cages in all directions, animals like a Bobcat, Serval, Canada Lynx and American Badger on cement floors in those corn crib monstrosities. Lots of goats, chickens and other domestics abound, with the star attraction being a 100-day old Ring-tailed Lemur and an 11 year-old American Black Bear that used to be in a god-awful cement cage but now that enclosure has been expanded to include a decent grassy yard. Apparently the bear refused to go out into his new home for a long time and preferred the smaller and antiquated cage section! I had a long chat with a volunteer at the zoo and she has been there for 19 years and she honestly sees nothing wrong with the cement-and-wire style enclosures and her opinion was that the animals were 'pampered and spoiled' every day of their lives. Some folks see absolutely nothing wrong with the deplorable condition of some of the cages in their local zoo, perhaps in part because they don't know any better. Anyway, Bear Den Zoo was a step up from the atrocious Jo-Don Farm & Zoo but it was still a struggle for me to spend 30 minutes there as it is very tiny.

Zoo #38:

Driving an hour north, I came to the best zoo of the 6 that I visited today in the form of Shalom Wildlife Zoo (West Bend, WI) and it is another new American zoo as its license was only just awarded in 2010. I spent a solid 2 hours here and I was walking for much of that time as the zoo is 100 acres, has 400 animals, and has a wide gravel road that takes visitors through the park. At times there are some beautiful exhibits as the ungulates have a great time at this facility. They are fed by many visitors and some of the pens (it seems as if everyone in Wisconsin calls zoo enclosures 'pens') are enormous. The Plains Bison, White-tailed Deer, Albino White-tailed Deer, Piebald White-tailed Deer, Red Deer, Sika Deer and Fallow Deer exhibits range in size from maybe an acre to perhaps 10 acres. It can be a bit hard for little kids to see a few deer, then walk 10 minutes through a forested area only to see a few more deer, and I saw some restless toddlers.

The flip-side to this zoo is that there are some disgraceful exhibits for smaller animals that are small cages with wire floors. How is that even comfortable to walk on? I saw two Fishers pacing badly, and other crappy cages with either cement or wire floors featured species such as American Badger, Coyote, Red Fox, Arctic Fox, American Mink and Virginia Opossum. All of those animals are found in cages that are beyond awful. There is also a big enclosure with Ostriches, Emus and Rheas (white ones) all together. Then there is a densely-packed Grey Wolf exhibit that is fantastic and full of vegetation and a brand-new Cougar exhibit that I would perhaps call outstanding as it is a contender for the largest Cougar enclosure that I've ever seen. Just when this zoo has its moment of greatness, like a spacious and natural-looking Grizzly Bear habitat, I walk into the gift shop and see rows of tiny American Alligator heads and turtle shells for sale. Disgusting! Want a gator head for your desk?

Zoo #39:

I've never gone through so many junky zoos in such a short span of time, but Glacier Ridge Animal Farm (Van Dyne, WI) is only 30 minutes farther north and it is a strong candidate for the worst of the 400+ zoos that I've visited in my lifetime. Other than the usual motley assortment of ducks, geese, chickens, goats and sheep, there was the daily fix of Dromedaries, Llamas, Alpacas, Emus, Ostriches and Ring-tailed Lemurs. One surprise was some Asian Water Buffalo (almost unheard of in American zoos) but this establishment has been left to rot in squalor. The zoo portion is apparently going to close down soon and I was the only visitor for the past THREE DAYS! The teenage girl at the counter almost had a heart attack as I accidentally scared her from texting and she literally fell over. OMG, a zoo visitor...LOL!

On the way out I ran into the owner and his big white moustache. He was far more interesting than his decrepit zoo! We chatted for a long time and he told me some wild stories. He doesn't really take care of his zoo much and has let it go to rot, which is obvious to anyone that treks through the place. He told me that his property is a working Bison Farm and that he sells meat and runs a herd of at least 15 Plains Bison. Other stories included the time when he sold a few White-nosed Coatis to Fort Worth Zoo down in Texas, all done via air mail. Or how last summer a baby Asian Water Buffalo was born during a snowstorm and he pulled the calf inside his house and kept it in the basement all winter...he said that the smell was something fierce! Or how the DeYoung Family Zoo bought their first Chimpanzee a few years ago from a private seller for $40,000. Lastly, his greatest zoo memory was that he had a pet Rhesus Macaque with him for over 20 years and it was like a little son. The monkey would follow him everywhere, it would lounge in front of the fire at night and they'd eat popcorn together on the couch. Zoo owners are a wacky bunch!

Zoo #40:

The 5th zoo of the day was another 30 minutes north and it is one that will hopefully undergo a metamorphosis in the future as there are Master Plan signs erected around Menominee Park. Menominee Park Zoo (Oshkosh, WI) is free, tiny and I easily saw all of the exhibits in about 30 minutes. There is an excellent, 1-acre Grey Wolf exhibit, a large American Elk enclosure, a decent North American River Otter exhibit with underwater viewing, and then the rest of the zoo is pretty poor. There is a central lake and the wolf, elk and otter exhibits are all on one side while the rest of the zoo is spread out on the far shore. That section includes skunks, llamas, several domestic species, some waterfowl, a Bobcat and not much else.

Zoo #41:

That brings me to the 6th zoo of the day and 41st of this exhausting trip. Animal Haven Zoo (Weyauwega, WI) is another of the many Wisconsin zoos that aren't the greatest and this slapdash menagerie has been around for decades. Once more the zoo's owners were more interesting than the inhabitants of the exhibits, but first of all the zoo itself has some decent hoofstock paddocks (loads of goats, camels, emus, ostriches, more goats, Aoudads, Plains Bison, Mouflon, etc.) but the carnivores don't do nearly as well. The zoo has 11 tigers (including a Liger) and a 12th on the way in August. There are a couple of African Lions and the zoo is building a 40 x 40 foot new lion exhibit in a few weeks as right now the two animals are in holding 'pens'. I saw them and the lions are in cages that are only twice as long as they are and so hopefully that new exhibit goes up fast! There is a black Leopard, at least 9 bears (Grizzly and American Black) and other species such as Cougar, Bobcat, Serval, White-nosed Coati and a handful of other exotics.

Now let's discuss the owners. They are exceptionally nice, hard-working people and it is a husband and wife team who run the zoo. Yet again, and this shouldn't surprise anyone, they've essentially been to zero other zoos besides their own. Special Memories Zoo is 30 minutes away and the owners of Animal Haven Zoo have NEVER visited and they hadn't even heard of most of the zoos that I'd just gone through this week. How is that possible? I told them that I'd been to more than 400 zoos (something I've only told a few people on this trip) and the owners treated me like a rock star. They started telling other visitors that I'd come all the way to Canada to see their tiny zoo, they asked me a lot of questions about other zoos and after I spent 1.5 hours walking around we sat down and had a good chat. They were so nice that it almost pains me to say that much of their beloved zoo is garbage. There is a Bobcat living in a 6-foot metal cage, a Coati in another metal cage not much larger, 11 tigers in very small enclosures and African Lions temporarily living in shoeboxes. The owners are delusional and think that their little zoo is wonderful and I didn't have the heart to tell them otherwise. They asked what exhibits they could improve and when I mentioned a couple of them (like the black Leopard cage) they became ultra-defensive and took me outside to show me another side exhibit that was connected to the main one. Never mind that the leopard was sitting in a small cement bunker...they live in a fantasy world.

Anyway, I behaved myself and we had a lovely chat. The man is 72 years old, his wife is 70 and they want to run the zoo for another 8 years. At that point they plan on selling everything (the house next door, the main building, the entire zoo) for approximately 2 million dollars and if no one buys the zoo then they've already checked out prices on bulldozers. I'm not even joking as they plan to demolish it all if they can't find a seller as their grandchildren “ain't worth more than some hairy monkey nuts and they ain't getting the joint for free”. Anyone interested on ZooChat? The annual visitor count is only 20,000-25,000 and I don't even know how they manage to eke out a living but the couple work 7 days a week from May to October every year. They have one employee on per day and then it is these two senior citizens running the gift shop, cafe, maintenance and doing everything around the zoo. I honestly don't even know how they manage it all and they never get a day off until the winter-time when they are snowed in on some days. They've got at least 16 big cats, 9 bears and another hundred other animals and these two seniors are doing everything with little to no help. They even told me that they don't bother with giving any of their animals annual checkups and most of the veterinary work that needs to be done they do themselves. Holy crap!
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The swastika at bear den is gone?
 
CGSwans said:
I guess my question (and it’s a genuine one, not a leading question) is what you are really getting out of these visits. 15 primate species is a lot for a small zoo, but wouldn’t be all that noteworthy in an established urban zoo.

You certainly don’t seem to have enjoyed at least a significant chunk of your stops on this year’s road trip. And as a further observation - it seems to be the more credentialed zoos that you had visited on earlier trips that you’ve written about in more detail and perhaps found more fascinating?

As an aside, I remember a long, long time ago when you used to question the merits of the ‘wood and wire’ zoos in the UK, which perhaps feature more prominently on Zoochat than they otherwise would because of our heavy UK presence. You’ve now been to an awful lot of US zoos with standards at or below the same level: I wonder what your thoughts on such zoos are now?
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There's a lot to discuss in your intriguing post and I suppose that a simple "I visit as many zoos as possible because I'm obsessed with them" answer might not suffice. First of all, I'll go off on a tangent and talk about movies. I love watching movies and I've been a film buff my whole life and in fact after zoos then movies would be my next obsession. I watch one every night and then many times in the early morning hours (I'm first up in the house) and so I average around 400 per year. Crazy, right? Just like zoos, I need to see a whole 'set' of movies. That means that I've literally watched every single Denzel Washington film ever...around 45 of them. I've also watched Robert De Niro in exactly 83 movies and it bothers me that I've never seen him in Dirty Grandpa, Killing Season, Grudge Match, etc. Up until a decade ago, I'd watched every Robert De Niro film of all-time, but do I really want to see some of the crap that he has made in the past few years? Part of me feels a strong urge to see those movies to complete the 'set' and in fact I've already put Grudge Match (Stallone v De Niro as aging boxers) on reserve at my local library. Will that movie be garbage? Probably, but I feel almost obligated to see it.

Some folks on this site can understand that mentality while most won't. James Stewart is a famous old actor who starred in films such as Rear Window, Vertigo, Harvey and It's a Wonderful Life and I've now watched 68 of his 80 films. As @DavidBrown well knows, I sat through The Magic of Lassie (1978), an abysmal movie, just so I could add another James Stewart film to my all-time list. The goal is to watch EVERY James Stewart film, or Robert De Niro film, or Denzel Washington film, etc., regardless of quality. With those actors I've seen all of their best stuff and now I'm at the point where The Magic of Lassie is checked off the list. Do you see how this relates to zoos? I've been to 20 out of the 23 zoos in Michigan and 28 out of the 34 zoos in Wisconsin and a small part of me wants to go back next year and tour the handful that I'm missing as it bothers me that I don't have the 'set'. The same thing applies to California (62 out of 70 zoos) or Texas (45 out of 52 zoos) but I've simply got to move on and deal with those omissions as part of me realizes the ridiculousness of the situation. In the big scheme of things, not visiting a few junky zoos doesn't matter and I accepted that a long time ago. It still irks me a little though!

I loved my recent 16 day, 50 zoo trip and that doesn't always come across in the reviews because a good chunk of the facilities were of a poor quality. I loved going to GarLyn Zoo with its new, crappy 'Tropical House', or to the Critchlow Alligator Sanctuary that had the guide with the AK-47 tattoo on his forearm, or even Animal Haven Zoo with its husband and wife owners in their seventies. It has been a fascinating journey and I know that @DevinL can relate a little because he has felt that his reviews come across more negatively than anticipated. Without even looking it up, I can recall that when I reviewed SeaWorld San Diego on my 2011 road trip there was someone who said that it sounded like I had a horrible time when in fact it was one of the highlights of the entire trip. My kids loved SeaWorld and we were there all day long and had a splendid time. But because SeaWorld isn't one of my favourite zoos and I'm not that partial to the place, then on ZooChat I could see how my report came across negatively. These tiny, backwoods Michigan and Wisconsin zoos are at times deplorable and so when I post a review on ZooChat some folks are thinking that I was dragging myself around some hellholes but in truth I ENJOYED going to those zoos and I took some kind of perverse satisfaction in seeing the junk of the zoo world. Some of those zoos might not even be around in a decade and so I could well be the one and only ZooChatter to document their existence.

However, there were some places that were so awful that I definitely did wonder if I was scraping the bottom of the zoological barrel by spending 20 minutes in the godforsaken Beaver Springs Park Aquarium or enduring that Bambi kiddie train ride at Animal Gardens Petting Zoo. Toss in the broken-down Glacier Ridge Animal Farm and the corn-crib cage 'paradise' at Bear Den Zoo and that gives you 4 attractions (all found in Wisconsin) that really should be shut down. I think that the 'wood-and-wire' zoos range greatly in quality. Just as I've now come to enjoy and in fact love older zoo architecture, I've also evolved in my views in terms of home-made zoos. Some are great while others are awful and that can apply to any zoos around the world. Some wood-and-wire collections should be bulldozed into oblivion while others are clean, well-maintained and acceptable in the modern zoological world.

You are right that I enjoy the repeat visits to the well-run, larger zoos and on this trip I went to Detroit, Toledo, John Ball, Great Plains and Omaha. On every trip I've tacked on a handful of repeat visits to make the long driving days more memorable as great zoos are worth seeing again. Those 5 were ones that I'd seen before and arguably the top 5 highlights of the entire trek, although Assiniboine Park Zoo in Winnipeg with its $90 million Journey to Churchill exhibit is right up there as well. I used to see all big-name zoos and aquariums but on my 4 solo road trips (2014, 2015, 2017 and 2018) I've been seeing EVERYTHING that constitutes a 'zoo' and I'm honestly running out of them now. The whole Western side of Canada and the USA is filled with zoos that I've already visited and at this point a typical 'Snowleopard Road Trip' might have to be altered to one that involves airplanes. Those kind of journeys would cost twice as much and so I can guess, looking forward, that I might go on a solo zoo trip every second or third summer...but I'd be spending money on a flight, a rental car, and motels rather than driving everywhere in a minivan that also serves as a bedroom. :) On a side note, my wife HATES that I sleep in the minivan even though it has saved me $2,500 just from the past two road trips. She is under the impression that crazy things randomly happen in America and has fears of me being beaten to death by neo-Nazi, anti-zoo nerd thugs and she would be left as a single mother with 4 young children. Yikes!

I think that the days of me sleeping in a vehicle are now officially over and I've got a phenomenal zoo trip planned for next time around...maybe even next summer! (If you are one of the 3 individuals on this site that knows about my next tentative trip then please don't say anything as I've been saving it as a surprise from even some of my closest friends). I'll reveal all in the future but needless to say it does not involve a minivan, would see me fly somewhere, rent a vehicle, I'd visit probably 50 zoos in 22 days, NONE of them I've been to before, and of those zoos there would be many days of 3-4 puny places and then quite a number of days of only ONE zoo per day. I'd visit at least 10 zoos that receive between 850,000 to 1.8 million annual visitors and it would be a world-class trip at some iconic establishments. The focus would be extremely narrow, which makes 'Snowleopard' sense as if you think of my 2015 trip that saw me tour everything in Texas (amongst other states), or my 2017 trip that was entirely in California, or this year's trek that saw me mainly in Michigan and Wisconsin. So the next one will have a narrow focus in a specific area, arguably 10 world-class zoos and many smaller ones as well. Intrigued? :rolleyes:

Okay, those 6 big paragraphs will hopefully answer all of the questions and maybe even shed light on my thought-process when it comes to touring zoos. Some can relate and others will just shake their heads. I can promise you that any future zoo trips will be a step up from the Wisconsin twaddle/poppycock/balderdash/codswallop that I just visited.

One more thing: I've got a 5,000-word essay on Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo & Aquarium that I'll post in another day or two.
 
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I can wholly understand all of the above post! Does it matter if you don’t see those places, tick off that zoo? Of course not. But doing so is the sort of thing which makes our three-score-years-and-ten worth living.

I don’t share Scott’s film obsession (even though I love film); for me, the only things that come close to zoos are football (the real version) and music. Do I need to see Bruce Springsteen, or Ian McNabb, or Tom Russell, or Steve Earle, live, again? Of course not. And although Bruce is pretty consistently marvellous, the others can be ropey, sometimes. But there’s a compulsion to chalk up as many shows by this lot as is possible.

Likewise, if I don’t make it to a Portsmouth match, the world will keep turning. But it pains me not to see them if they’re playing (I’ll miss the first game of the season, next Saturday, against Oxford, and I feel slightly queasy at the thought). This analogy with zoos works well. More often than not, Portsmouth matches are the equivalent of Beaver Springs Park Aquarium, rather than the Henry Doorly Zoo. I seldom feel happy watching them play. But I wouldn’t not do it for the world! Same with zoo visiting....
 
DavidBrown said:
How broad is his definition?
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To be fair to @Jonas Livet, I think the places he lists are those which contain animals - which, to my mind, makes them zoo-ish. Possibly a few farm park type places sneak in there - but the website is tremendous (even if it does beggar the question of how he ever has time it do anything other than visit zoos).

CGSwans said:
You know what causes me physical pain? Reading this paragraph. :( The Alhambra is a true gem.
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I feel a bit like the West Bromwich Albion players who, famously, when they visited China in the late 1970s, complained that, “you’ve seen one wall, you’ve seen them all”.
(this short clip also contains some brief, fascinating footage of a Giant Panda in a circus, incidentally). And of course I wouldn’t say no to a visit to the Alhambra. But I’d say yes to a zoo visit first.... Zoos are my thing (or one of my things). Moorish architecture isn’t.

sooty mangabey said:
I’ll miss the first game of the season, next Saturday, against Oxford, and I feel slightly queasy at the thought)
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Nobody but me will care about this error, but others may empathise with my need to correct myself: next week’s game is against Luton, not Oxford. I wouldn’t be able to sleep if I had propagated such an inaccuracy.
 
snowleopard said:
One more thing: I've got a 5,000-word essay on Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo & Aquarium that I'll post in another day or two.
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Two words, hurry up! :p

sooty mangabey said:
Nobody but me will care about this error, but others may empathise with my need to correct myself: next week’s game is against Luton, not Oxford. I wouldn’t be able to sleep if I had propagated such an inaccuracy.
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I made a similar mistake last season with the last match being on a Sunday and I typed Saturday, mortified is an understatement. And being a Birmingham fan it was extremely unforgivable as our next season depended on the result of that game...
 
Hey, I used to create zoos out of little plastic animals too!

I for one cannot fathom going on the types of trips snowleopard embarks on every summer. I do get the idea of wanting to see every possible zoo you can as I have that urge with zoos too and breweries for that matter. However, I (and my wife) like to have some semblance of balance on our trips. We visited many zoos on the trip that concluded about 10 days ago, but we did skip a bunch of minor zoos and a few more significant ones such as Great Plains, Como Park, and Louisville, plus we didn't go far out of our way for other zoos, most notably Sedgwick County. While it would have been nice to visit those zoos, the opportunity cost is too great imo when we would have been missing out on a lot of other things those areas have to offer. Plus, the enjoyment level of visiting zoos has diminishing returns when going to one after another day after day (at least for my wife and I).

Now it sounds like snowleopard may have Europe in his sights, which we do as well. We may visit next summer, but while we would certainly visit some zoos, that won't be the priority of our first trip to the continent. There's just too else much to do and see.

But as the saying goes, to each their own. And as my wife likes to say, you be you.
 
And I'm definitely looking forward to this comprehensive review of a zoo that I recently visited and loved, but it at least somewhat controversial on here.
 
Your wife need not worry about you sleeping in the van if you would just learn to act like a real American and pack some heat! :p

Since you have NOT told me about your next trip, I have no secrets to reveal but I would be willing to bet it will be Germany.
 
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