Skip to main content

Summer in North America 2018 Part 7 - Assiniboine Zoo

On the Wednesday that we were in Winnipeg, we had a full day of events! One of MM's sons, whom I used to babysit when they were little is now called 'Doctor' and has lovingly and jokingly upgraded to 'boy toy'. :D  Luckily his real girlfriend and DH have good sense of humor. ;) That day, he was free so the four of us went to the newly renovated zoo. 

In the twelve years that I lived in Winnipeg, I've only visited the Assiniboine Zoo once. It wasn't anything special, just another zoo in another city. I had been hearing Winnipeg people raving about it since the renovations, especially about the new Polar Bears; so we decided to check it out.




It was a hot summer day with clear blue sky (that's not rare for Winnipeg) that even I decided to put sunscreen on. We bought tickets on the spot, but if you prefer you can buy your tickets online. The zoo was organized into several zones, most of which can be reached by riding a free open-air shuttle. We started out by walking through the Grassland & Boreal Forest Zone towards the Journey to Churchill zone.






She took over the navigation job










We reached the Churchill area and of course we had to take a picture with the sign :) I was trying to explain to Miss Kiki that in Churchill we could see Polar Bears and Beluga Whales, and that it's in the same province as Winnipeg. She said she already knew that from grade 2 in school. :D

Aside from Polar bears, in this area they were supposed to have Arctic fox, Snowy owl, Caribou, Muscox, and Seal. Unfortunately, the Arctic fox was nowhere to be seen. We did see several Polar bears though, and that was pretty amazing. I am a bit torn about zoos in general. On one side, I feel bad that they are trapped in there. However, how else would millions of kids and adults be able to see them up close and hopefully create more love and awareness towards nature. 
















Such large window with barely visible seams
And finally.... we reached the Polar bears! They were big and fluffy and these were still cubs, I believe. They swam around the pool and they looked so cute. However they were doing the exact same movements over and over again it was like a routine. So I wonder if they were actually depressed there...







































From the Churchill zone we continued to browse the other areas but the boy had to leave early to take his pooch to the vet. DH, Miss Kiki, and I went to the Extreme Bugs zone. There were billboard ads of this zone and Miss Kiki got excited because she loves bugs (except spiders)...






Well we got there and she was absolutely disappointed because it turned out that the Extreme Bugs display did not showcase any real bugs but instead, they had these giant bug robots that made noises and somewhat moved. Who goes to the zoo to see robots anyway?! It was hot and dry and we were sweaty, sticky, and thirsty. They had some water fountains in the zoo but not a lot. There was a water bottle refill station but we didn't have a bottle. We ended up buying a bottled drink from a vending machine and then refilled that bottle. 




Soon after, we waited at the shuttle stop and got a ride all the way to the exit... 


We left the zoo in time for a late lunch, and we went to a newer Japanese restaurant that had good rating for their ramen and other non-sushi food. It was called Dwarf no Cachette. We met up with the boy again for late lunch. We each ordered a dish that sounded good plus a gyoza appetizer to share. While waiting for our food to arrive, Miss Kiki went to the second floor to browse their gift shop. 







The dishes they served was very large, I almost felt like one bowl can feed 2 adults. We were disappointed with the flavours... it didn't taste that good nor authentic. It was a bit funny when I ordered my food, the server couldn't understand my pronunciation of their Japanese-named dishes. I had to say it with a Canadian-English accent for her to understand. :D 





Please stay tuned for my next post, the other half of Wednesday in Winnipeg!





Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Nintendo Switch Sleeve Tutorial

Hi! I'm Kirana from woofkiki.blogspot.co.id . I am going to write an introduction for this blog post. We bought a Nintendo Switch in Japan.  I really liked it and played with it almost everyday. If you're wondering what a Nintendo Switch is, it is a video game where you can basically  "switch" everything. The joy-cons and even the game! You can also connect it to your TV. It would be nice to bring it around with you, but when you put it in your bag... Oh no! The screen scratched! So, this is a sleeve that will fix that. Let's get started!😊 Kirana Now the tutorial (by Kirana's mom)... 1. Make your pattern according to the picture below. It is basically a 6"x24" rectangle with a semi circle at one end. Note: this is not a printable pattern 1. Cut your outer fabric, lining, and batting(optional). In this tutorial, I used minky for lining and a pre-quilted fabric for the cover, so I didn't need extra batting. For batting, I recomm

Labuan Bajo 2023 Part 3 - 3 Days 2 Nights Diving Trip With Chakana Liveaboard

  Photo credit: Lukas Rissing @thestudypacker A live-aboard experience is one of the highlights of Labuan Bajo. It has been on my bucket list for a while but every time I tried to go, something just didn't work out.... until now! The opportunity arose to join an impressive-looking boat this year and the dates matched Miss Kiki's holiday perfectly, how could I not take this rare chance! With less than a month to prepare, we booked plane tickets, accommodations, and whatever equipment we thought we might need. So off we flew to Labuan Bajo with little preparation and a lot of faith. ;) You can read the first and second parts of the trip in my previous posts. After we checked out of our hotel on the third day, we went to the pier and hopped on to a dinghy that took us to Chakana Liveaboard, a 47-meter-long phinisi-style yacht that was going to be our accommodation for the next two nights. My heart raced as we approached the pretty boat and spotted a group of staff excitedly wavi

Labuan Bajo 2023 Part 2 - Leisure Day Trip

I booked a leisure day trip for our second day in Labuan Bajo via Traveloka . When I say leisure, I meant a non-diving trip. We have a live onboard trip booked for the 3rd to the 5th day but that one is a diving trip covering different places and adventures so we tried to cram the other must-visits of Komodo National Park in one day. For breakfast that morning, we had breakfast boxes that the resort had prepared for us by order. The tour was operated by East Cruise Komodo and it was an open trip consisting of thirty-something people. East Cruise Komodo picked us up at Sudamala Resort where we stayed at 5:30 am and brought us to the harbour. The re-registration process at the harbour took about half an hour and after we were assigned a boat, we boarded. On the boat, our tour leader collected what was supposed to be the entrance fee for the National Komodo Park. It was IDR 150k per person for locals and IDR 300k per person for foreigners. We never saw the tickets but later on, we foun