London Day 11: Zoo

 

male lion paws, London Zoo

31 December 2024

The events in this post took place on December 24, 2024.

According to Google, there was a bus stop on the road that separates Saint Pancras and King's Cross rail stations. There was supposed to be a bus that would take us to the north end of Regent's Park, to the London Zoo.

We walked back and forth several times. There was no bus stop. No buses even passed by. Running out of time, we hopped into a taxi.

The zoo isn't a big one. It is spread out, though. 

We saw zebras

and okapis.

The lemurs were curled up, catlike.

In the monkey enclosure, the animals were free to climb wherever they wanted, including over our heads. There were hanging trays of food up there.

Goeldi's monkey:

Golden-headed lion tamarin:

Coppery titi monkey:

The zoo property is on both sides of a road, with a bridge and an underpass to connect them. The underpass has murals.

Kermit the Frog is painted into the frog:

Coffee beans and a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle:

We watched the penguins. One was doing laps, jumping out of the water. I tried to follow it with my camera. (The video isn't uploading properly. Phooey.)

Lounging lions:

There's a certain look cats get about them when they're gearing up for a yawn. I stood by.

Can you see the stick insects in these photos? They're gigantic.

Some kind of crab:

Spider nursery! Now we're talking!

Guatemalan tiger rump spider:

Bird-eating tarantula:

There was a walk-in enclosure for the golden silk orbweavers. Finally, after 10 days in London, I could be face-to-face with a live spider. Not the prettiest things, these orb weavers. But they get points for being large.

I went looking for males, which are much smaller. However, there is large variation in female size, so I'm not sure that the one on top here is a male or a small female. I couldn't get close enough to tell.

We had lunch in the zoo cafeteria, which wasn't as bad as we feared. Then we walked north to Primrose Hill, crossing the Regent's Canal.

We went into the shops there, to look at books and to get provisions for tomorrow's lunch. Everything would be closed on Christmas. After that, I left Jack at the bottom of the Primrose Hill park to go to the top of the hill. The incline looked like it would be tough on a bike, a double-digit incline. Ridewithgps says it's only 4.8%, but ridewithgps is known to underestimate.

Looking south, the tall tower near the center is the BT tower, close to where we were staying.

To get back to the hotel, we'd need to take the Northern Line at Chalk Farm. It was getting dark enough for lights to start showing.

We crossed the Primrose Hill bridge over the canal into Chalk Farm.

Years ago, when Jack would spend six weeks looking at manuscripts in the British Library, he would stay at a flat in Chalk Farm. We passed the building on our way to the station.

We came up in King's Cross rail station, which isn't as grand inside as Saint Pancras is.

We made reservations for dinner at an Italian restaurant around the corner from the hotel. Before that, there was time to lift weights again. In keeping with the hotel's unusual color choices, the floor was a blinding, fluorescent green.

When we got back from dinner, we started packing, even though we'd have all day toomrrow to do it. I sat down with my iPad and took notes for the blog.