San Diego Zoo

The boyfriend bestowed me with a Canon Rebel T3 on our first anniversary. We’ve been dating almost 2.5 years and I’m now just getting around to using it more and more. It’s kind of nutty because I lusted over DSLRs before getting one. Now that I have one, it’s a bit intimidating. I also didn’t realize how bulky it would be to carry around. For a girl that only uses big bags to get to and from work, carrying a larger bag to fit a DSLR is a big change for me.

We took the camera with us to San Diego a few weeks ago. I stuck the memory card in my laptop a few days ago and holy crap, we managed to take almost 500 pictures. A lot of them are repeats of a ridiculously beautiful sunset we watched at Point Loma. There’s something to be said for the quality versus my everyday iPhone pics. I’m still trying to get through all of the pictures but for now I leave you with a few snaps from our 4 hour trip to the San Diego Zoo. It blows Chicago’s Brookfield and Lincoln Park Zoos out of the water. Initially, I balked at the $50 entrance fee, but it was definitely worth it. Besides, the boyfriend is an animal nut and to see him grinning from ear to ear is priceless. (Psst, click to view the full high resolution versions.)

I still can’t get over how vivid they are, so far from the tacky pink shade I normally envision them to be.

This is a red panda aka the animal depicted in the Mozilla Firefox logo! I can’t take the credit for this random factoid, the boyfriend shared this random bit with me when I was in awe of how quickly he knew what it was.

The pandas were the only exhibit that really had a line. I’m not sure if our experience was out of the norm, but the sign by the line said 45 minutes. We were in and out in approximately 15 minutes. For some reason, I imagined pandas would be bigger but they definitely seemed smaller than polar bears, maybe even half the size.

I’m glad I had a pair of comfortable shoes on that day, it was a great way to enjoy the perfect sunny weather. Are you a zoo fan? What animals do you love to see?

P.S. Don’t forget about the giveaway that I’m participating in with other bloggers from the Windy City Blogger Collective. Win $250 of products here! You only have a few days left.