Day 24: Animals dead and alive

Wang Wang on the prowl

Back to the city centre today to visit the Adelaide Zoo and see Wang Wang and Funi, the giant pandas, which was really exciting. You have to book in to see the pandas (even though you don't pay extra for the opportunity) and then you go into their enclosure at a specified time.

Funi (the female) was catching some shut-eye, but delighted everyone when she moved (to yawn). There were ooohs and aaahs all round. Wang Wang (the male) was on the prowl in his separate outdoor space, but seemed quite distressed, as he was pacing up and down a set path with relentless determination.

This was all very intriguing, but I must say I did enjoy my viewpoint from right in front of the very large fan that was blowing cool air around. (It was quite warm by this point.) Callum and Andrew soon tracked me down and discovered that I am not just a pretty face.

The rest of the zoo was well set out and there was much to see. However, some of the creatures were hiding away from the hot sun and so could not be found. (Any missing gaps were filled in later at the South Australian Museum were their stuffed counterparts were quite happy to be on display.) Andrew fell in love with a goat, and now has a long list of animals that he would like to have as pets at home (dream on), a chimpanzee being at the top of the list.

Meaningful eye contact

The Westpac Envirodome was also informative, showing us how the world is going to pot by 2050 if we don't sort out global warming. A quick calculation indicates that Duncan will be hitting 90 and me 80 by then, so it will be Callum and Andrew's problem really, because we will probably be pushing up daisies by then. So, moving on...

After our customary picnic in the park, we went off to the South Australia Museum, which houses a bunch of interesting stuff (including the aforementioned stuffed animals). There was an awesome tyrannosaurus rex skull (or rather the cast of one), the most complete skull of this creature ever to be found; an extensive Aboriginal cultural display and various Pacific Island cultures; a section on fossils and opals, meteorites and gemstones; and finally an Ancient Egypt room, complete with a couple of mummies, sarcophagi, hieroglyphics carved into rock (original, not faked) and a few mummified hands, feet, a head and some cats. I didn't know that Egyptians would shave off their eyebrows in mourning for the death of a family cat. I knew cats were sacred and all that, but still...eyebrows?

An impressive meteorite

A bit of a tousle with the local rush hour traffic and we were back home. There were a few wistful thoughts of the relative quiet of the Launceston streets.

The SES has issued an Extreme Heat Watch for South Australia. Ooooh. Scary. If there are no more blog posts you will know that we have melted.