Good luck guys - should be a great trip. Let us know what you make of the zoos - it's a very high-quality batch, overall.
Yes, I DID mis-calculate. Harderwijk is in there somewhere. Still overall my advice would be to not do 2 zoos like Apenheul and Burgers in a day. That would be too much of a challenge and would somewhat compromise a good zoo visit. All the same enjoy this mouth-watering road trip!
They're not doing both in a day - each gets a full day, as far as I can tell from their itinerary. Friday 29th will be Hardewijk, they have that locked in. Then they have four zoo-visiting days: Saturday 30th Sunday 31st Monday 1st Tuesday 2nd And four collections they want to do over the course of those days: Burgers Rotterdam Artis Apenheul So unless they chose to spend multiple days at a single collection, they won't have trouble devoting a full day to each.
Less than 24 hours, you can tell it's getting close because we've started packing! Our zoo visiting starts on the 29th with Harderwijk, then 30th is Arnhem and 31st is Apenheul. June starts with a trip to Rotterdam on the 1st and then Artis on the 2nd. Very much looking forward to it, and will try and keep everyone posted as best as possible
The holiday is drawing to a close now and all the zoos are done. I will try to do more in-depth reviews another time, but with internet access only on my phone this is difficult to so, so for now I will make a summary of highlights and lowlights of each collection. Harderwijk - highlights: - the underwater viewing in the cafe and seeing the dolphins in good sized groups. - seeing my first walrus, a species I've wanted to see for a long time. Also, Steller sea lions and harbour porpoise. Harderwijk - lowlights - shows all seemed fairly commercial, specifically the main dolphin show. Obviously as the commentary was all in Dutch I can't comment on the educational aspects of the show, but it seemed if was done more for effect rather than education/animal welfare going on the visuals. - size of the enclosure for the Steller sea lions. I found it odd that smaller species such as the common seals and California sea lions had far bigger enclosures and the second largest species of pinniped they have got one of the smallest enclosures in the park.
Can you tell more about their behavior, especially Olivia's? That's right if we are talking about the main show (the Dome). What about Lagoon show?
Sorry, can't help with the walrus behaviour, just seemed to be normal pinniped behaviour to me. Also, don't know which walrus was which so can't help in terms of Olivia's behaviour. Didn't see the lagoon dolphin show, my comment was made in relation to the dome dolphin show, the Steller sea lion show and the walrus show. It's possible the ones we missed were much better. As we were done at Harderwijk with reasonable time to spare, and as our train connected at Amersfoort, we decided last minute to do a quick trip around Dierenpark Amersfoort. Amersfoort highlights - impressive to see a large number of coypu. With these once common in the UK up until all zoos stopped keeping them over here it was nice to see such a big group. - oriental garden area was nicely done Amersfoort lowlights - it was difficult to plot an actual route around the zoo. It seemed in parts that we were walking around in circles, not because we were necessarily lost but because paths branching off from a circular route seemed to put you further back down from where you came from. Missed the cheetahs and Persian leopards, not a huge problem but not labelled on the map which seemed odd. (There may be a better way around than we took - these highlights and lowlights are based on personal experience of the specific visit only, not an actual reflection on the collection itself.
Burgers' Zoo - highlights - the Desert, undoubtedly. The whole exhibit was an absolute joy to walk around. The sheer scale and imagination behind the exhibit is something completely unrivalled in Europe that I've seen so far. - the Ocean, especially the main tank, was absolutely breathtaking. - the safari section again was a joy, simply the scale behind it was fascinating. Burgers' Zoo - lowlights - the biggest lowlight of the day was the fact that despite repeated efforts and long sit downs at both enclosures, neither on-show ringtail put in an appearance. Needless to say, Arnhem will be getting done again next time we do the Netherlands for this main reason (which we hope will be soon).
I suspected that you had not seen this taxon.... because I had not recieved a text taunting me about it
Quite fun to read your comments JR Amazing how your view differs from mine on quite a few accounts, but that's fine. I'll wait till you get to the point where you rated all the zoo's you visited for more of your views (best of all, the Blijdorp vs Burgers' discussion!). Keep em coming.
Just read this thread from the beginning.......I've been to Artis and Amsterdam a few times but no other dutch collections......what a great idea....thinking I might just copy it!....now just need to convince the wife.....hmmmmmm
I'm afraid my best shot at taunting you this time is proboscis monkey - that will have to do you @jwer - important to remember that these are simply highlights and lowlights of the day, rather than any review of the collections. For what it's worth regarding the Burgers' vs. Rotterdam debate it's so close you couldn't fit a sheet of paper between it, but I personally would say I liked Rotterdam better *just*. @newzooboy - had a great time, I would highly recommend it. Our train journeys were approx 60 euros for both of us return on each one, so not overly expensive, and the trains are easy enough. Rotterdam - highlights - black and rufous elephant shrews was the highlight species for me and it was a treat to see these. - oceanium - between ocean and oceanium, I felt ocean was the better *aquarium* but I did prefer oceanium as a zoo building in general (hope that makes sense). Particularly liked the Caribbean and sea if Cortez sections. - polar bear cubs making full use of their pool. I've never seen young polar bears before, so it was great to see one of the youngsters in the underwater viewing right up at the glass. Rotterdam - lowlights - knowing that the Riviera Hall was once something much more than a large indoor playground with a few birds in the side wing.
apenheul - highlights - does proboscis monkey go without saying? Truly a delight to see this animal, a species of primate I've always wanted to see along with red-shanked douc langur (now seen), golden snub-nosed monkey (yet to see) and Bald Uakari (yet to see). - fantastic enclosures for the majority of species, particularly the huge gorilla island. I like the mixed species approach to gorillas in the Netherlands and wish it was replicated over here. A guenon or colobus would make me spend longer in gorilla kingdom at London (was this ever actually tried, or did I dream that?) - grey langur walkthrough - it was wonderful to get so close to these Apenheul lowlights - I genuinely can't think of any lowlights for Apenheul looking back, I had a truly brilliant day (it has been hard to pick lowlights for all of the collections in general). I'm sure Apenheul does have faults, after all where doesn't, but I can't say anything detracted from the day.
Just as well that you didn't leave the trip a couple of months, it seems! https://www.zoochat.com/community/posts/880136
Saw that earlier and couldn't believe it. I think it's a huge shame that they're going out of the species, I think it's another case of just plain bad luck. I was interested to see what would happen, but my money was on the individual staying at Apenheul even if they decided not to pursue the species further.
Finally we get onto Artis, which I did like but not as much as I'd thought I would. artis - highlights - nice reptile house with some very nice species - nice small mammal house, though I think some of the occupants need moving out - mainly the spider monkeys spring to mind. - a really nice setting and great historical value. - the Amstel styled aquarium was a nice touch showing conservation done locally. Artis - lowlights - it didn't seem there was a logical route around the collection - this isn't so much an issue, but just against my personal preference of a 'loop' around the zoo which is clear. We must have walked the length of the bird house a good few times: once to see the outside aviaries, once through the building itself and then to go back up past the aviaries to go into the reptile house. Again, there may have been a better route but the one we took seemed to require a lot of doubling back and going around in circles. - huge school groups of screaming children (not a reflection on Artis, but on the day). Not usually an issue, but said children were running around unsupervised, barging into and past other visitors, screaming, fighting, banging the glass and whatever else would make a good amount of noise, especially in the echoing buildings and corridors. All in all, one of the worst shows of behaviour I've ever seen in a school group at a zoo.
It is a shame you didn't see the Ringtails at Burgers'. I was lucky enough to see two of them on my last visit. As someone that frequents the Rotterdam Zoo I am kind of embarrassed to display the Riviera Hall in this way, it used to be a really charming building in my opinion. On another note, I hope you have seen Agile wallabies and Putty-nosed monkeys in some other zoo, because these species only recently left the collection.
With regards to the ringtails it's just one if those things, I will be planning on going back to Amsterdam within the next 12-18 months (or Cologne). If the former, we will do Burgers on the off-chance, along with Avifauna which I'm sorry to have not got around to this time. I have seen Agile wallabies at South Lakes and Putty-nosed monkeys at Duisburg, so although it was a shame they'd gone it was no huge deal to have missed them.
