A Feast with the Beasts - our Thanksgiving day at Hogle Zoo

Thanksgiving day dawned gray and wet, but we had a date for a Feast with the Beasts so we bundled up and headed to Noah's favorite place: Hogle Zoo!

There, we met up with my Dad who delivered to us my cutie niece Meghan - we were without Dante (in CA again) and she was boarding with my parents for a week while my sister & her husband went on a cruise (poor suckers - Fun & sun... but no Pumpkin Stomp!) and my two other nieces stayed with a different grandma, so we thought we'd drag her along with us. I think she loved it.

So armed with umbellas, we headed for the elephant habitat, where they were said to be stomping pumkins at 10am sharp. And they were...

Apparently this is yummy stuff for elephants cuz they chowed down!

Next stop: the great apes - for yummy Thanksgiving pie (well, I didn't taste it but I'm sure it was delicious)!

And this curious little monkey got a paper mache turkey

He wasn't sure what to make of it at first. He snuck up, took a swing at the mysterious object and jumped back as it rolled off the pedestal.

Then he quickly reached inside and yanked out some chopped veggies to munch on.

Meghan was squeeling with delight over the little monkey while Noah was staring in awe of the huge orangutan in the next habitat. She was getting her own thanksgiving treats and impressing the crowd with her strength by shaking her climbing tree with all her might.

And on our way by, Meghan & I still got a peek at the orangutan.

The rhinos are always a favorite but they never seem to be close enough to get a good look at them (see Zebra shot below)!

But we got lucky on Thanksgiving and both Noah and Meghan were happy to see them munching hay so close to the observation window.

Noah even gave an excited squeely "why-wo!" to impress us.
Both mountain lions were up and pacing. I was sad Dante wasn't there to see them. They're his favorite.

Up at the Asian Highlands habitat the tigers were getting pumpkins too.

And it was SO crowded at this point, we didn't get any more pictures of the cats! But Noah managed to spend a fair amount of time with his favorite big cats:

The statues. Hehehee

Some other favorites we saw:
The giraffes,

a grassy-ass black bear,

and the aforementioned shy zebras.

A favorite we did NOT see: The Red Panda. My favorite and so shy! But it was getting cold & windy so we decided we'd had our fill. We hit the Conservation Carousel and then headed back to my parents for some turkey dinner of our own!

Happy Thanksgiving!