Barcelona, Spain
This morning, we went to the Barcelona Zoo, where we had the most amazing zoo experience of our lives. (Despite the fact that the white gorilla featured prominently in all the signs had deceased some years past.)
We saw emus running amuk with zebras, flamingoes hanging out with peacocks, a gazillion antelopey things, a few meerkaty things, some other things that I’m not really sure what they were, (what can I say? The signage was in Catalan, not Spanish), a variety of bison, elephants, giraffes, leopards, lions, monkeys, iguanas, aligators and crocodiles, turtles, rhinocerous(es), etc.
I also saw a vulture bite the head off of a live baby chick and carry the decapitated head around in his beak, dripping blood. Yeah, you heard me. And yes, although cool in a Discovery Channel sort of way, it was every bit as gross as it sounds.
As crazy as it sounds, we also saw a bear drink from a plastic bottle of Coke, and two hippopotami (hippopotamouses?) start a round of mud wrestling, followed by some heaving making out. Yes, that’s right, we saw hippos FIGHTING and KISSING. I told you this was a crazy day.
We rounded out the evening at Las Ramblas, a long strip of food, shopping, and unapologetic people-watching. We walked down to the water, where we saw the Mirador de Colon (Columbus Monument) and bought a Barcelona Dragons fútbol (soccer) jersey.