Since we had explored most of the city on our first day, we decided to try something different. Igor and I sort of have a tradition of going to the zoo when travelling. We have been to the San Diego zoo and the Frankfurt zoo, now we have been to the Helsinki zoo.
We got up late. Heidi and Kahil left early for work and allowed us to sleep in, which was very nice of them. So once we ate some breakfast and had some not too bad instant coffee and hot tea we set off to walk to the zoo. It's fun exploring this way because you end up seeing things that not many other people, outside of maybe locals, get to see. For instance, we walked by the Iranian embassy and the Chinese embassy on our way to the zoo. They just happened to be on our path. There really isn't much to see, but kind of cool all the same. It took us probably an hour to get there. We also passed this totally awesome looking obstacle course, which we vowed to come and visit if we are ever back in Helsinki during the summer. We saw a much smaller, much lousier one in Colorado earlier this year, but this one looks amazing though (sorry, I didn't get a picture of it).
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| Zoo Entrance and yes that is a giant sloath |
One of the most awesome parts of the Helsinki zoo is that it is on an island. How many other zoos, that you know of, are on their own private island!? Anyway, because it is the dead of winter, most of the cafes and park amenities are closed for refurbishing, which makes since as there really aren't many people who want to go to a zoo in the middle of winter. A bunch of the animals were not out either since, for example the bears are in hibernation, the tropical and many of the African animals had been moved inside, etc. We still got to see a lot though.
As we walked around many of the birds of prey were out and the big cats were really active. We saw a Lynx, Mynx, snow leopard, wildcat, tigers, a lion and a bunch of other big guys. Since there were no crowds we got to get up close and see them too, which was awesome.
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| Mynx |
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| reindeer |
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| Lynx |
Then we went into the African and Asian/South American animal and reptile house. It was a nice change from the cold outside to the humid tropical warmth of the reptile house. I lost Igor at one point and ended up meeting one of the animal keeper who was feeding the meerkats little cockroaches. I didn't have the guts to ask if I could feed them, mostly because I didn't want to touch the cockroaches (eww). Igor came in shortly after and we started talking to the zoo keeper more. Then Igor asked her if she would feed one of the snakes so he could see how it ate. He had never seen this before. After just a little (and we are talking really minor) hesitation she said sure and then took us to the unicorn snake (Vietnamese long nose snake aka "rhinoceros rat snake").
After we watched her eat, the keeper took us to see Igor's other favorite reptile the skink. This big guy is an especially good climber (shocker why Igor liked him). He was all over the place, on the fake rock walls of his terrarium, literally hanging on just by his finger nails. Then the keeper took him out of his cage and he was off, climbing all over her and the walls and then she let me hold him!!! Igor didn't want to. It was one of the coolest things ever. The skink climber all over my arm and then headed for my hair. The keeper pulled him off me just as he was trying to get to my head. The pictures aren't great because he moved fast and a lot but I think we got a couple of good ones in there.
We thanked the keeper immensely and then headed back outside to walk the park some more. We saw some reindeer and camels, a snowy owl and some other really big birds. Then it was time to leave and go back into the city center to meet Heidi and get some cheese cake. :)
Throughout Scandinavia there is a large department store that had a shopping center on the ground floor called Stockmann's. This is where Igor and I ate quite a few times because they have a good selection of hot foods that they make fresh and the usually have a place for you to sit down and eat. So this is where we met Heidi. She had never been there. She said it was because this is where are all the rich Swedish people come to shop and then was aptly surprised that the prices were really reasonable. Just goes to show that assumptions can keep you from really great things. You should almost always just try.
Anyway, we got cheese cake and something called a Napoleon went back to Heidi's place and she made us some Indian street food. We talked about her and her travels. Heidi put on a dvd of her favorite comedian (Fluffy for those wondering) and we watched the stand up act to the end, though Igor fell asleep about half way through.
And that was our last bit of Helsinki. Below are some additional zoo pictures.
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