We Took the Penguin Plunge!

I have been so excited about the Penguin Plunge Exhibit at the Calgary Zoo.  For the past year, I have walked by the site on every one of our zoo visits, and seen it progress from a poured concrete foundation to a beautiful new building.  I have read with interest the penguin facts posted on the bridge over the river, and smiled at the penguin images affixed to the pathways.

Knowing that the exhibit was scheduled to open in late February, we posted a zoo trip on the momstown Calgary calendar, and crossed our fingers that it would be open by the time we came to visit.  In early February, the official opening date of February 17th was announced, and we thought we had timed our visit perfectly. Fast forward to last week.  Kids and adults anxiously awaiting the big day.  And then, just it came, it got cold.  We wondered whether we should postpone the trip. We worried that even if we went, the kids would not survive the wait. Hesitantly, we decided to bundle up and take our chances.

The line seemed impossibly long. We joined it anyway.  It took about 30-40 minutes of standing in the cold, but conversations with good friends made it seem shorter, and the kids were more patient than I could have imagined. Check out the impossible cuteness of this pair. Mom made that hat!

Suddenly it was our turn! We headed into the building, and were transported out of Calgary to a magical place:

From the environment of the exhibit, to how strikingly close we could get to penguins, to the antics of the penguins themselves, it took our breaths away:

We loved every moment:

In order to control the amount of visitors, right now you can only stay in the exhibit for a pre-set period of time. When ours when up, we headed to the nearby hippopotamuses and giraffes to warm up.  The momstown stroller brigade arrived:

And it was pretty fun there too:

I am so glad that we took the plunge and went! A wonderful book to accompany a visit to the Penguin Plunge exhibit is "If You Were a Penguin" by Florence Minor.  With beautifully detailed full scale illustrations, and rhyming text, the book engages kids and invites them to imagine the things that they could do if they were a penguin, cleverly weaving in a number of age appropriate facts about the birds. It has been a favourite in our household this winter as we have anticipated seeing the birds in person.