Our first field trip of the 2013 – 2014 school year was a beautiful one and we will be going back soon. If you have never been to the national zoo in Washington DC it is worth going to. Admission is free and this is a great value for homeschoolers and large families. Parking is $16 for 3 hours and $22 for more than 3 hours.
TIP: This park takes more than 3 hours to see everything!
As it is not officially school time for local schools here we made sure to get there at about 10am when it opens. The web site said that the parking lots tend to be full by 10:30am. While some of them might have been, parking lot D had many spots bother when we arrived and when we left. We parked in the shade and even with an 85 degree day, the van was cool when we got back to it and that was really helpful.
While some say homeschoolers are not social those people don’t tend to know what they are talking about or sadly know of a rare sheltered homeschool family. In this day and age that does not tend to be the case. I had to smile when one of the first interactions my children had was with one of the zoo keepers. We had been going into the barns and a man stopped us to let us know there where no animals in there at the moment but that he is going to feed the fish. My 5 year old told him she loves fish and talk to fish. The man walked us over to a railing near by and he had a bell and much to our amazement when he rang it, the green water seemed to suddenly boil with excitement. The Koi jumped and splashed over the top of the water. They knew food was coming. The kids asked many questions and where very social while the zoo keeper fed the fish. Asking about the lone turtle who seemed to think he was a fish and how the fish where happy to seemingly try and sink him to get to the food first. The kids instantly where making plans to try and train their own fish. They asked questions about the white fish, who are actually cat fish and not Koi.
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