Miller Park Zoo-Bloomington, IL

After visiting the Peoria Zoo we took the hour drive over to Bloomington, Illinois to check out the Miller Park Zoo. It took us a while to locate Miller Park Zoo because our directions were wrong. (Mapquest directions took us to a totally different part of town. Glad we were able to call Hotch and he could get us there.)  The Miller Park Zoo is only 8 acres in size and the smallest zoo we have ever been to. They have a wide variety of animals which surprised us, but the animal exhibits are very small. This zoo is perfect for young children.

We loved checking out the bald eagle because they are Braxton's favorite birds. We were sad to learn that the critically endangered red wolf's range has been decreased so greatly and that it only resides in a small eastern section of North Carolina on the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge.

Next to the red wolf was a small building with a bunch of reptiles, amphibians, small mammals and a random bird.  

The little ones took the time to put zoo puzzles together and to read some animal books while Alyssa just played along.

The kids loved getting to see more meerkats and some adorable chinchillas. If you looked through the giraffe you could get a close up of them.

Then we headed back outside to see the remainder of the animals. Some of the animals we saw were Vietnamese pot-bellied pigs, reindeers, a fox, alpacas and a north american river otter. 

I am not a fan of birds because they smell awful. This exhibit did stink a lot, but it was cool seeing the birds wander freely.

Delaney cracks me up with that foot on the tiger's head. She looks like a hunter. The only cat we saw inside was a small bobcat all curled up in a ball.

There were much larger animals in their enclosures outside. They seemed lethargic and we felt bad for them. This zoo has very small animal exhibits. They had Mueller's gibbons, a snow leopard, a Sumatran tiger and a Malayan sun bear.

These hydrangeas were stunning! Love how fluffy they looked.

We have a family tradition to always find an animal that looks like Hotch. We decided that this red ruffed lemur reminded us of Daddy.

Braxton was so excited to find more Galapagos tortoises. He looks for them every time we go to a zoo now that he knows that tortoises can become huge. (His sweetheart, Debbie, told him all about turtles and tortoises.) 

We enjoyed our short time at the Miller Park Zoo. It only takes about an hour to see the whole thing so afterward we headed back to Franklin, Indiana. We stopped to get lunch and fill up on gas before our final drive for the day back to Aunt Rita's. When I was pumping gas the wind was so insane it was whipping my hair around. Alyssa took a photo since it was so crazy!

Our trip from Peoria, IL to Franklin, IN was a smooth 236 miles because we were able to see two new zoos and enjoy our day!