Skip to main content

Wild Ropes and Taronga Zoo


One dose of high wire acts wasn't enough for Alex and B. Today it was another zoo and another tree tops adventure at Wild Ropes in Taronga Zoo.

This time there was no pressure on me to join them and we bought zoo entry tickets as well, catching the ferry across from Circular Quay and riding the Sky Safari cable car up to the top. Along with chairlifts that's about my limit for high wire transport.


The verdict from Alex and B was that, despite the easier continuous belay system of Wild Ropes, the Trees Adventure at Nowra was more fun, though Taronga had the better views from the top.





While I wasn't photographing them from below I checked out the platypus and nocturnal animals display of the zoo. The bilby was cute, but watching a bat eat a chick was the highlight.



Afterwards we raced down to the seal show, which was enjoyable, but I think the message on sustainable fishing needed to be said in a few languages. By now the wind had greatly picked up and it was cold.


We watched a bit of the gorilla feeding, then the raptors, owls and cockatoos fighting the wind in the bird show. To our great disappointment the chimpanzees were nowhere to be seen, but the reptile house provided some welcome relief from the chill outside.




Once you discount the harbour views we really weren't that impressed with Taronga Zoo. It seems to lack character and we didn't feel involved with the animals. I would say it was the least enjoyable zoo visit of the last few years and that's a pity.

Maybe it was the weather. The Sky Safari was slowed down due to the winds and at one point we were stopped, suspended and shaking in the wind.


Fortunately we stayed indoors for the ferry ride back as those at the front of the boat were splashed by the waves in the rough waters of the harbour.

When we arrived back at Padstow we discovered the Indonesian restaurant gone, but fortunately there was a new and really nice Vietnamese place, Four Seasons, to dine at instead.

I'm pretty certain we'll find ourselves back at a tree top adventure park sometime in the near future. But that's enough for now.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

My first overseas trip: Singapore and Malaysia

I've always loved to travel. My first memory is of sitting in a an aircraft, aged 18 months or so. Yet I never believed that I could travel overseas. To me, it seemed like something you did when you retired, or if you were rich. That all changed when I met B. She had not only travelled overseas, she was from overseas . B was born in Malaysia and arrived in Australia, with her family, in 1988. She still had relatives and friends in Malaysia and Singapore and she, along with the remainder of her family, planned to return for a visit during the Australian summer of 1995. At the time I was staying in B's mother's house while we were studying at university. After B's father passed away the year before I was the nominal "man" of the house and its high maintenance garden; her brother Michael was studying up in Queensland. B and I were quite inseparable and her mother kindly offered to pay for me to join them on their vacation. So it was that I obtained my very firs...

One night in Canberra

It's the April school holidays and we are too busy to have a break but need one because of that. And because it's the Easter weekend the options are limited, so we just drive down to Canberra for the night. No, this isn't our first trip for 2023. I wrote about Japan on another site .  I refuse to wake up early so we depart after 8.30 AM. There is not much to say about the drive except that the clouds seem so low and Lake George is very full. We stop at a rest area and at the lookout up the hill to take it all in. Everyone is hungry so we first stop in Dickson and then can't think of anything to eat, so I drive us to Civic, where we can't decide and end up eating at the Singaporean Killiney Kopitiam branch.  The Canberra Centre has nice shops. I dream of getting an iPad from the Apple Store, we buy a blanket and toothbrushes from Muji and wish that Lego wasn't so expensive. Nothing we can't get in Sydney, but then we rarely go out shopping in the city. It...