I think of Edinburgh as a place that has so many things to do and see. And yet, when it came to the question "what do you want to do today", both myself and Eleanor were stumped. Our plan had originally been to have a lazy day at the meadows and have a barbecue late afternoon, but typical Scottish weather made us rethink our idea. And so, we took to Google for inspiration of "touristy" things to do in the capital. Although we were left feeling rather uninspired by the lists of quite expensive or, in all honesty, rather boring sight seeing things, we spotted on one sight Edinburgh Zoo. That was the winner for us. So despite having a late night and still being in our jammies at 10 o'clock, we managed to get ourselves together and on the bus to the zoo.

I've only been to Edinburgh zoo once before, and that was about five years ago, so I couldn't really remember any of the animals or what it was like. All I knew was that I needed to be there in time for the penguin parade.

So here is a collection of my favourite animals and pictures for you to see.


 So I don't know if it was because for a lot of last term I was learning about how humans developed from apes or if its because a new planet of the apes is coming out, but I was really excited about all the monkeys that the zoo had. And there were a whole lot of different types. The little monkeys were really cute, but I just loved seeing the big apes in the section called "the Budongo Trail". A few of them were swinging about, others were grooming one another, it was just really cool seeing them up close. And those photos above also happened.

One of my favourite parts of the day was when we went to the "Big Cat" section and there was a spotted leopard. While we were watching through the glass, he came off of his branch and walked right down to us and stared at us. It was so cool to see, and while we were all watching him, you could hear him growling and it echoed through the glass. It seemed so scary, and I was so thankful for the glass between us.


Oh and we also posed for these photos.


Eleanor's favourite animal that we saw was the Koala bears. For some reason as soon as we got into the park she was so eager to see them, so when we finally found their enclosure she was so happy. Apparently, Koalas sleep for most of their lives, but we had timed it right to see a mummy Koala move branches to eat the Eucalyptus the watched as her baby followed her slowly and unsteadily across the branches to join her. While we were in the enclosure, there was a zoo employee in there too telling some other people about Koalas, which we of course listened in to, and it was fascinating to hear about them.


My favourite out of all the animals there were the penguins. I just love watching them waddling around, and at this time of the year the penguins had baby chicks, so we saw a few of them sitting on eggs and one sitting on a little chick, which looked absolutely adorable. The best part of all though was the Penguin Parade. This happens everyday at 2.15, and the penguin enclosure is opened and they are allowed out to walk along a path. The whole parade lasts maybe 5 minutes at most, and everyone there is lined up to make a human wall so that the penguins don't escape. At one point though one of the penguins came right up to us, as if trying to get onto the grass behind us. The Parade started in 1950, when the park keeper didn't close the gate properly and all the penguins came out of their area. So the keeper walked around the circular path with the penguins following on behind him, and lead them back into their enclosure. And its become a tradition ever since. It genuinely looks as though the penguins are loving the attention and they line up at the gate waiting to get out and show off, although only a few actually decide to venture out of the cave. I think I smiled throughout the whole parade, it was just such a funny sight, I loved it.







And that is a summary of my day at the zoo!
Hope you enjoyed reading it and seeing a few snaps from it all.
Lots of love,
Emily
xxx