Beasts, Lights, and Friends

This afternoon we decided it would be fun to jaunt over to the zoo to check out the critters and a special Christmas time display they do called zoolights. We were to make a a double date, taking Ed and Erin along with us. Unfortunately, Ed wasn't feeling up to doing much of anything due to a rather uncomfortable ailment that attacked him yesterday and lingered. Though she would be leaving her love behind for a while, Erin still wanted to come.

We piled into the car and explored the major highways a bit as we searched for the zoo. We found it in soon enough and had plenty of daylight left to poke around and see the animals before the sun set.

As we stepped foot into the zoo, we were warned from the start that most of the African animals would be in hiding from the bitter cold. Who could blame them? It was in the 20's after all! Nonetheless, we bundled ourselves up like awkwardly packaged gifts, and lumbered happily all over that zoo.

The Oregon Zoo is one of the smaller zoos I've been to. However, the variety of animals they house is fairly impressive. I never tire of viewing exotic animals from around the world as well as admiring the creatures we can find around here.


The weather got increasingly cold as the evening fell upon us. Though I was wearing thermals, snow pants, gloves, toque, sweatshirt, and an incredibly delightful puffy down jacket, I was still quite cold. It didn't stop me from enjoying my surroundings, but it did have me empathizing with all the animals that perhaps are not so use to this kind of weather. I was astonished to see three beautiful lions sitting out in the open. I was struck by the fact that I could see the steamy breath of one lioness as she let out a sleepy yawn. It didn't seem right to have them living through a northwest winter. Somehow they didn't seem to mind too much though. And we were certainly able to see the beauty that the cold brought as we beheld scene after scene of frozen water. We were impressed by the glory of the frozen columns that formed under little waterfalls here and there. Yes, you can be happy even when cold.

The zoolights were super fun. Of course my blurry pictures aren't that great, but you'll just have to take my word for it. There were lights in the shapes of animals all over the whole zoo, some seemingly alive with movement. Trees were alight, fences glowed, sidewalks were illuminated.... The feeling of festivity took over as the sun slipped completely out of sight, leaving us to bask in the glow of Christmas celebration.