Wintertime break – Let’s go to the Omaha zoo!

If you live in a northern tier city, you know winter is never fun for a variety of reasons. One major bummer is the lack of things to do. Well, a zoo can help beat the winter time blues. Especially, when that zoo is one of the best in the world.

Henry Doorly Zoo and Aquarium offers enough indoor attractions to make it a worthwhile visit – the Lied Jungle and indoor rainforest, Scott Aquarium, Mutual of Omaha Wild Kingdom Pavilion, Butterfly Complex and the Desert Dome. Plus, an assortment of winter animals provide some outdoor viewing.

On this particular trip, we stopped at the Desert Dome, Kingdom of the Night and the Cat Complex.

The Desert Dome offers attractions from deserts from around the world. we checked out the meerkats and the kliffspringers. We saw an interesting group of cliff animals – rock hyrax. They looked like giant guinea pigs, but they are actually related to the elephant.

Following the Desert visit, we headed downstairs to the Kingdom of the Night exhibits, which feature nocturnal animals from around the world. A major attraction right now is the baby aardvark. It was sleeping during our visit. Still, it actually looked cute.

The zoo has a contest to name the aardvark. My youngest daughter submitted her recommendation.

Afterwards, we headed to the cat complex to see the new baby lion cubs. they are about two weeks old. Unfortunately, we did not get a good look at the cubs. It was feeding time, so they were with their mommy. We decided to check out the polar bear, figuring temps in the 30s would be perfect for him. Nope. He was not out and about. In fairness, the bear was probably in its cave for nap or feeding time.

Instead, we spent some time at the mountain lion’s area. He was very vocal. People would gather around his enclosure, and all he did was walk around. People left, he started up again. People came back, he shut up.

We did not make it to the Lied Jungle and Rainforest (my choice).  So, that means there is another trip in store for us.

So, do not let the snow or cold control you. Take advantage of the attractions in or near your community. Break the wintertime blues and enjoy your local travels.