Racine Zoo

2131 N Main St
Racine, WI 53402
(262) 636-9189
website

We arrived at the zoo and immediately turned to the right to use the restroom. These seemed to be fairly clean and easily accessible.
Then we headed to the Great Cat Canyon to look at the lions who were very easy to see. There are multiple viewing areas and it looked like there were 4 lions in there. We couldn't really see the other two animals in this area. They were hiding or something.
We then headed to see the penguins. This was disappointing. There were only 4 of them and they were huddled near the door. The other side is full of meerkats. They were fun to watch for a bit. Then we saw the mountain goats. They were laying at the very top which was neat.
We made our way to the Walkabout Creek. This was less than thrilling. First, the kangaroos and other animals were way in the back, hiding behind the plants and things. And the creek had no water in it due to a disease. We saw a total of two animals and we didn't get a great view of them.
Bear Ridge was also quite boring. The bear was hiding in the cave which you could slightly view from down below. However, it was so bright out and so dark in the cave, we saw a paw and nothing more.
We did take a little train ride. The train itself was cute and my son is 5 so he really enjoyed it. As an adult though, I found it to be very boring. The only animal the train went past was the bear (which I already mentioned you couldn't see) so you literally see nothing while on here. Plus, it costs $2 per person. Not outrageous, but not a steal.
My son really wanted to play at the Play Zoo (playground) – which I think is a really nice addition to the zoo for a little break – but there were a lot of older school-aged children there with some kind of kids day program so we didn't take advantage of this. It looked fun though.
It is located right next to the rhinos. Then is the camels where you can pay for camel rides. And then in the back corner are the giraffes. For $4 per person, you can feed them at certain times. You get 2 crackers per person to feed the giraffe. I thought this was interesting, but I didn't like that I was required to pay for both myself and my son (because he's under 10) when I had no intention of feeding it myself. So other than that, my son had a great time! Once he got over his initial fear, he loved feeding the giraffe.
We made our way past the pond to the monkeys at the vanishing kingdom. Then we left. We spent a total of an hour here and spent $26 for 2 people. That seems a little high to me, but I guess zoos need to get as much money as they can to stay alive.
Overall, I don't think I would return to this zoo because we didn't really have the greatest time, but it wasn't terrible, I guess. The one thing that made everything worth it was the giraffe feeding. So if that's something you've never experienced, I would recommend going.