San Diego Zoo

My family had our annual 'reunion' (which, for us, means all of my siblings and their families, and our parents - just the immediate family alone is 27 [and 1/2] people now!) down in Carlsbad, CA, in mid-July. We had a lot of fun together, even if it was pretty hectic. So many people, and so many theme parks many planned to visit. One that we all did together was the San Diego Zoo, which I had never been to before. Zoos are really one of my favorite places in the world (as long as I don't think too much about how confined the animals are). This zoo did not disappoint. Except for my poor 27-weeks-pregnant body, I had a great time! It is a HUGE place, and I'll admit that we didn't walk through too many of the exhibits, but took the trams around most of the park. And I'm not ashamed of it...that's what they're there for, right?
Anyway, I had a lot of fun with my family, and with my big ol' camera aimed at those beautiful animals. Here are some of the pictures of the animals that I took.

The baby giraffe! She really sat in this same spot (almost) the entire time we were at the zoo. I LOVE her fuzzy tufts of hair at the top of her horns.

I believe this is the baby and her daddy. I spent the majority of my time at the zoo with the giraffes, which, to be honest, is the main reason I wanted to go to the zoo.

I have NEVER seen an elephant act this way before. She scratched herself (legs, head, body, feet, everything) all over this rock, for good amount of time. It was pretty funny to see her manipulate her HUGE body around this rock to get every inch.

No, this is not a baby elephant. He's just ridiculously small compared to the other elephant in his pen, who was ridiculously LARGE.

Pretty lizard! I love all of those colors.

Tortoise! The poor trainer tried desperately to get him to reach his neck out for a treat for the crowd around him, but he just wasn't having it.

The one zebra at the zoo was in this TINY pen. Next to a kangaroo, and a few other random animals with equally small pens. I felt really bad for them. But I think this picture proves that zebras are white with black stripes, right? Check out its legs!