Aviary: A walk in the bird park

The first outing we had during Hubby's off days was a visit to the bird park. The older kids had been there before Li was born. At that time, Yan had looked like Li now and Li insists that the little girl in those bird park photos was her! The bird park entrance fees were not cheap. I had been impressed by the professional look of its website. So, I grudgingly agreed to go and paid the fees (still small compared to the cost of a night sat in a hotel, I told myself) hoping that the actual thing is as good as its website had looked. And I'm glad to report that I was not disappointed :) The first thing I noticed was the shades. There were plenty of big trees to give shade and it was pleasant to walk even under the midday sun. The park was quite big so I didn't feel short changed at having to pay the relative high entrance fees. The second thing I enjoyed was the birds themselves. They were everywhere: darting in and out of shrubs, perched on tree branches, on hill slopes, walking among people, pecking the ground, predatory birds were in enclosures. The variety of the birds were impressive. There were peacocks, pelicans, flamingos (although their pond could be better taken care of), chickens, pheasants, owls, eagles, macaws, ostrich, emu and others I couldn't name. I enjoyed the bird show so much I thought the show should have been longer than 15 minutes. The kids enjoyed it too. The best thing I like about the park was the fact that we could get close to the birds instead of just admiring them in their enclosures. I was glad the aggressive birds were not running loose among us. One ostrich kept pecking at the wires of the fence of its enclosure, I thought it wanted to get at us. There was one walk-in enclosure that I consider the highlight of our visit. It was after the bird show and Hubby was eager to leave before rush hour and possible rain from the gathering clouds. We were on our way to the exit and the path led us through the walk-in enclosure. Here we were allowed to feed the lories milk and kuacis. Lories are like small parrots. Seeing the lories perched on people's hands and shoulders to get at the food, Heng was very eager to try. For RM2, the worker gave him s small cup of milk in one hand and kuacis in the other. Almost immediately, a few lories came and perched on his fingers and wrists. Seeing their 'Gorgorki' surrounded by birds, Jien and Li wanted to be part of the action. Only Yan was contented at not having a bird land on her. We spent quite some time here because the kids were enjoying themselves tremendously. Hubby was clicking away on his camera seeing his beloveds surrounded by birds. Li was not the least bit afraid of having the lories claws pinching her skin. Finally, the crowd got unbearable in the walk-in enclosure and we left. We stopped by the souvenir shop on the way out. Bought a couple of T-shirts for RM15 each. I was tempted to buy the better looking ones for the kids but the price of them could not persuade me to categorise them as needs instead of wants. So, I left telling myself the kids had more than enough clothes, which was true. We didn't run into the rush hour traffic jam. Nor did the heavens open. And we arrived home satisfied that the day had been an adventure.