We Went to the Zoo, Zoo, Zoo

Last Thursday was Maura’s class field trip to the Franklin Park Zoo. At her school they get one big field trip each year so their trip to the zoo was one of the highlights of their school year. I went along as a volunteer chaperon. It was a long day but I’m glad I could help.

I arrived at school in the morning with Maura. We walked from home despite the promise of rain because I didn’t want to worry about parking at school. As a special treat we stopped for breakfast at the donut shop about halfway between home and school. One I had signed in at the office and the kids had settled into their classroom I went down to meet them. I was one of two parent volunteers for the class. I was assigned four students to watch during the day, Maura and three boys from her class. Then we boarded the bus and headed to the zoo.

It was a long and trying day for me but it was fun too. Once at the zoo the class split up and I was alone for the day with my four charges. I had not expected the class to be split up that way. It was all up to me and the kids what we did with the day. We managed to see pretty much everything the Franklin Park Zoo has to offer, except the giraffes. They were in their house staying out of the cold. It was not a warm day and it threatened to rain all day though it never did. I’m certainly glad for that. Many of the best exhibits at Franklin Park are indoors but there were lots of kids at the zoo and they all would have been crowded inside if it had been raining.
My four kids were all very good and excited about their trip to the zoo. Everyone wanted to see everything and they were remarkably patient and didn’t give me a hard time. They biggest problem was keeping them together. Someone was always running ahead or trailing behind and I feel lucky that I did not lose any of them.

Everyone has their own favorite animals at the zoo. I’m fond of the mandrills and the tamarins in the rain forest exhibit. Maura likes the lemurs. All the kids like the emus because they heard a story about emus in class. One of the peacocks that wander free in the zoo gave us a nice suprise. It fanned out its tail and put on a display for us. It was very impressive.

I was completely exhausted by the time we got back on the bus. Maura put her head on my shoulder and took a nap. I wish I could have done the same but it was a noisy and bumpy ride back to the school.