Baby Meerkats at the San Diego Zoo

There are two little baby Meerkats at the San Diego Zoo.  They were born on March 12, and are just now starting to wander out of their den.  I got a few pictures late yesterday afternoon.

     

     

Baby Hippo at the San Diego Zoo

There's a new baby hippo at the San Diego Zoo.  He (or she - they don't know yet) has been pretty hard to see so far, as Mom is doing a good job of protecting him (or her).  I did manage to get one shot the other day.

Just to help put this into perspective, since it's hard to tell just how little this one is right now, here is a shot of Funani, the mother, taken from the same spot with exactly the same magnification.

   
   

Connor - Malayan Tiger

Here are a few new pictures of Connor, the Malayan Tiger at the San Diego Zoo, taken between January and April of this year.  Connor recently had his fourth birthday, on April 2.

He's gotten pretty good at picking up food with his paw.

Here's a shot we won't be getting in the future.  They've re-worked the tiger enclosure and split it into two sections, so that they can have more than one tiger out on view at a time.  In order to do that they closed off the access from the upper to the lower pond, and built a big stone wall where this ledge he's standing on in this next picture used to be.

Connor is temporarily staying at the other end of the Zoo while they re-do the landscaping in his yard.  It's not a very good place for pictures, but I've managed to get a few.  Last I heard he is scheduled to move back home in mid to late May.

Click here to see a few more pictures of Connor, the Malayan Tiger at the San Diego Zoo, from January through April of 2015.

       

Black-Casqued Hornbill

One of the guys I spend a lot of time shooting pictures with at the San Diego Zoo has nicknamed this female Black-Casqued Hornbill as Phyllis.  If you've ever heard the noise that these birds make you'll understand why.  

      

Reptiles - San Diego Zoo

The San Diego Zoo has a great collection of reptiles.  Here are a few recent images.

The big Monitor Lizard is always fun to watch.  This thing is huge.

Here's something I learned recently.  In all the years I spent in school I don't think anyone ever mentioned this.

Click here to see a few more recent pictures of the reptiles at the San Diego Zoo. 
      

California Road Trip - January 2015 - Part 4 - The Road South

We made quite a few stops on our journey home from San Francisco, and spent 2 nights in Santa Barbara along the way.  See Part 2 of this series for the California Missions that we visited, including the Santa Barbara Mission

We stopped for a few minutes at the intersection of CA-154 and US-101 to get a picture of this sign.  California Highway Patrol Officer Jim O'Connor was a good friend when we were growing up. He was riding in a 4-man formation with 3 other CHP motorcycle officers around a sharp curve on CA-154 when a car crossed the center line and struck him head on. He died at the scene, in November of 1990. This interchange was dedicated in his honor last year.

We didn't find all that much to do in Santa Barbara, so after breakfast on Friday we went to the Zoo, and then the Mission.  But, first we had to stop for breakfast. We went to the original Sambo's (founded 1957), which is right down on the beach.  The building may be newer, but they still have some of the original artwork hanging there.

The Santa Barbara Zoo is small compared to the one in San Diego, but it is nicely laid out, and a pleasant place to spend a morning.

They have a big collection of reptiles and insects.

I thought this was a helpful graphic.

The baby anteater was cool. That's his mother he's crawling over. She's trying to take a nap.

Synchronized ducks.

They do have a few big cats, which are always my favorites.

It took a while, but I did even find some tigers.

     
Click here to see more images from the Santa Barbara Zoo.
     

California Road Trip - January 2015 - Part 3 - San Francisco

We spent 3 nights at the Chancellor Hotel on Powell Street in San Francisco.  It's in a perfect location for exploring around town, most of which we did on foot - although we did ride a cable car one day.

We spent most of one day wandering around Golden Gate Park - the San Francisco Botanical Garden, the Japanese Garden, the Conservatory of Flowers, and other areas nearby.

Here's the Japanese Garden, one of our favorite spots.

Going up and over this bridge is tougher than it looks. It's quite steep.

The Conservatory of Flowers is California's first municipal greenhouse, completed in 1879. It's patterned after the Conservatory at Kew Gardens, England.

We've been to the San Francisco Botanical Garden a few times now, but only this time did we learn that many of the limestone walls that frame different parts of the Garden were originally part of the construction of a Cistercian monastery founded in 1188 in Santa Maria de Ovila, Spain. Apparently William Randolph Hearst bought the monastery buildings in 1930, and had them disassembled and shipped to California with the idea of putting them back together as part of a retreat in Shasta County.  Things didn't go quite according to plan, and eventually the City of San Francisco acquired the stones, and they wound up here.

The Botanic Garden has a huge variety of plants, and looks different depending on what time of year you visit.

San Francisco is a great city for walking. We like to start out from our hotel just off Union Square, head through Chinatown out towards North Beach, and then down to Fisherman's Wharf and back. There are lots of things to see along the way, and always a few places to eat as well.

Heather got some advice from Confucius before we left Chinatown.

Something about this mural caught my attention.

From Chinatown we stepped onto Columbus Avenue and into North Beach, the Italian section. Of course we had to stop for a cannoli and some coffee.

The old Cavalli Italian bookstore is now a cafe. We had heard that the cannoli here were the best in town, and I think that is right.

We walked up Lombard Street, the Crookedest Street in the World, and watched the cars driving down. There are steps on either side of the street itself, so you don't have to worry about getting run down by a disoriented tourist.

Fisherman's Wharf has lots to look at.

There is a big warehouse-type building on one of the wharfs that is now a huge collection of old arcade games, all of which you can play. Lots of fun stuff, including my new favorite game, Whac-A-Mole. I've heard the term for years, and this game has been around since 1976, I can't believe I've never actually seen one before.

Apparently Heather still had some lingering doubts after listening to Confucius, so she got a second opinion.

After wandering around Fisherman's Wharf, we hopped (well, actually we had to wait in line quite a while) on the Cable Car and rode back to Market Street near our hotel.

We walked over to the Financial District for our last dinner of this visit to San Francisco, at one of our favorite spots, the Tadich Grill.

We had a great time in San Francisco.  

   
Click here to see more images from our stay in San Francisco in January.