40 By 40 #12 and 13: Oakland Zoo

Lest I lead you to believe only San Francisco has things to do, my next few posts will be about activities in the East Bay.  #12 and #13 visits to the Oakland Zoo - a regular visit and a special holiday (Christmas) event called Zoolights.

#12 - Oakland Zoo
Enoch loves animals - actually, he loves to growl and roar, so by default, he loves animals (and dinosaurs). So, a trip to the zoo was bound to come soon. Even though San Francisco and Oakland both have zoos, several locals recommended Oakland's.  And, it helped that there was a Travelzoo deal at the time. So #12 is our first trip to Oakland Zoo, a 100 acre zoo that includes animals from the rainforest and African Savannah and a rides area (with a train, kiddie roller coaster, cars, and more...)

#13 - Zoolights
From the day after Thanksgiving until early January, Oakland Zoo has a special nighttime exhibit called Zoolights. It's a festival of lights with "colorfully lit animal themed structures",  some of them set to Christmas music and movie scenes. It's cute.  Definitely fun for kids to be in the zoo at night. Don't worry, none of the animal exhibits are available except the reptile house and The Outback. The Outback exhibit is accessible via the train, so visitors can search for wallaroos at night. For more kiddie thrills, the rides section was open and Santa was available for pictures (although Enoch wanted no parts of him).

Here are a few pics from our time.

The kids with Big Daddy and Me-mo Mickels

It took Enoch a minute, but he finally warmed up to the idea of petting a goat.

Like father, like son

ZooLights