PTR: Columbus Zoo and Zoombezi Bay

As some of you know, my wife and I are big fans (and members) of the outstanding Columbus Zoo and Aquarium. When we renewed our membership last month, we upgraded from the standard Family Zoo Membership into Individual Gold Memberships. This membership is a full-year pass to the Zoo, along with a full season pass to Zoombezi bay, and includes free rides on all the rides in the Zoo and Jungle Jacks Landing. Since our daughter, Avery, is only 15 months old, she doesn't require a pass (yet!). The cost for 2 Gold Memberships, including free parking, was a modest $200.

This past Saturday, we packed up my sister, niece, nephew, and my mom to head up to the parks for the day. The zoo opens daily at 9:00am, Jungle Jacks Landing at 10:00am, and Zoombezi Bay at 10:30am. We decided to get to the zoo as close to opening as possible, to enjoy some peaceful time with the animals before the onslaught of crowds began. We arrived early, flashed our membership to park for free (parking is usually a meager $5), hopped on the parking lot trolleys (it amazes me that Columbus Zoo can do this, but KI and CP parked theirs years ago), and were dropped off right at the impressive new gate structure (pictured above, photo courtesy Columbus Zoo and Aquarium). We used our passes to buy discounted tickets to Zoombezi Bay to the rest of the family. Zoombezi Bay tickets are gate priced at $32.99 for adults ($24.99 for kids under 10), which also gets you admission into the Zoo and Jungle Jacks Landing (which operates on a ride wristband system).

We headed into the Zoo and enjoyed some time in the North America Region, which is where you'll find the brand-spankin'-new Polar Frontier, a jawdropping Polar Bear, Kodiak Bear, and Arctic Fox habitat which opened new for 2011.

Polar Frontier:

Avery, looking up at the polar bears swimming above her with the awesome underwater viewing:

Habitat Hollow Petting Zoo:

Other North American region photos:

After completing the loop around the Zoo's North America region, we stopped by a few of the kids favorite animals before we headed out of the Zoo and over too Zoombezi Bay.

Penguins and Flamingos in the zoo's "Shores" region

Amur Tigers in their beautiful "AsiaQuest" habitat

Koalas and the Kangaroo Walkabout (along with a fantastic lorikeet aviary) can be found in the Australia region

At this point, we left the Zoo and headed over towards Zoombezi Bay, which is a short walk thru Jungle Jack's Landing from the zoo. On this path, the first thing you'll come across is the Animal Encounters Village. This is where the zoo's promotions staff keeps their menagerie of animals (typically, animals aren't taken off exhibit to appear in shows or on television), including a troupe of Chilean Penguins, several reptiles, a handful of baby flamingos (they have 2 flamingo enclosures on property), and the famous zoo "frenemies': A young cheetah and dog which have been raised together since birth.

Columbus Zoo photo

While we were at Animal Encounters Village, there were several presenters with different animals around the camp, including one at the flamingo yard encouraging visitors to meet and pet the birds, a few people out in the grass with a snake at least 8' or 10' long, one handling a large lizard of some sort for kids to pet, and 2 people on stage with the penguins, trying to teach them to hop up steps and thru a window for the Zoo's upcoming bird show.

This is one of my favorite parts of the whole property, and I'd recommend it to anyone.

To get to the Zoombezi Bay gate, you pass thru Jungle Jacks Landing, a decent little rides park the Zoo built over the last few years. Here you'll find the classic Sea Dragon wooden roller coaster, a Scrambler, Tilt-a-Whirl, Safari (Himilaya), Flying Scooters, Bumper Cars, Wave Swinger, as well as 'Jungle Jacks Junior Land', a collection of kid-friendly rides.

Zoombezi Bay has added 2 new slides this year: Big Boa Falls and Python Plunge. Both slides share a tower (and I'm not even sure which is which), but one is a short MasterBlaster water coaster, and the other is a halfpipe type slide. The new slides are fun, and a great addition to the already solid lineup. The park is also home to a ProSlide Tornado, a family raft ride, mat racers, several body slides, several tube slides, a ProSlide Bowl, Action River (great for transportation around the park, with 4 entrances), huge water fortress / play area, a small lagoon play area for the younger children, and a unique adults only lazy river which encircles a bar.

With a 15 month old, we naturally spent most of the day in Katoomba Lagoon, the smallest kids area. We did take a few pics of Avery adventuring around the park, which can give you a taste of the architecture and look of the park.

Here's Avery (along with myself and her Gigi) walking into the park for the first time (we were here 2 weeks ago, but she's started walking since then!)

Katoomba Lagoon: This is where we parked for the day

"Dad, what's behind these rocks?"

For those of you who have never been, take a look at the park's map. This place is monstrous!

Full-sized PDF available at: http://columbuszoo.org/assets/zoo/user_files/file/2010_gate_map.pdf

Thanks for reading!

Aww, cute kid!

The Columbus Zoo rocked my socks off. I am 10min from the Toledo Zoo which holds its own in this country (I think like a top 20 Zoo) but wow, the Columbus Zoo has amazing exhibits, its HUGE and has such a great collection of animals. I cant wait to get back with my new lens...

Some good shots in there! Good TR.

A little disappointing considering I read the tread title really fast and somehow read Zombie Bay... but this was still a great TR. I haven't been to an awesome zoo in a long time as I am like 90 minutes from San Diego and everyone in my family is out of the general zoo age range, but when I was younger I LOVED the zoo... although I still enjoy it.

A little disappointing considering I read the tread title really fast and somehow read Zombie Bay... but this was still a great TR.

Maybe this will help...

I'm a little confused by the picture... but... MUCH BETTER!!!!!

Also I just noticed it... but that last picture of you're daughter is hilarious. I literally don't think there is a word to describe that expression... it's like shes kinda shocked, kind of scared, and kind of confused all at the same time, lol.

I was looking to see if you got a picture of me, I was working at Zoombezi Bay in the pizza and wings place that day, WAY too crowded at the zoo. Nice trip report though!

I was looking to see if you got a picture of me, I was working at Zoombezi Bay in the pizza and wings place that day, WAY too crowded at the zoo. Nice trip report though!

I've got to tell you how impressed we've been with the quality of food this year compared to last. The pricing is reasonable, the quality is above average, and the staff thus far has been wonderful. Each visit this season we've stuck with the eatery closest to Katoomba Lagoon, but it seems like things have improved park-wide. Crowds at the waterpark Saturday were totally manageable, but the hoards of people at the zoo was, well, a zoo!