PapiMami

Thursday, November 18, 2004

Yiyi's First Trip to KL Bird Park

Last Monday, we brought Yiyi to the KL Bird Park located in Lake Gardens, Kuala Lumpur.

Being a public holiday, the traffic was awesome in KL, which is why I love to go to the city centre during long public holidays. The journey took us only about less than 30 minutes from home to Lake Gardens, which I imagine would easily take 1 and 1/2 hours on a normal working day.

The Bird park opens daily from 9am to 7.30pm. There are various activities and programmes through out the day, such as bird shows, hornbill feeding, eagles feeding, stork feeding etc. It is the world's largest covered bird park covering an area of 20.9 acres. Very impressive.

We arrived at about 10am. Not many people at that time, just nice. Ample parking space. The ticket cost us RM24 for 2 adults (RM12 for adult and RM6 for children). At the ticket counter I saw a paper board at the ticket counter that shows the ticket price for adult is RM24 and RM12 for children, and I was about to complain how expensive when the operator told me "RM24 for two adults". I kept quiet and paid the fees, and the operator handed me two blue paper wrist band. Later, we realised some foreigners were wearing a different colored wrist band: brown. Are they charging a different rate to foreigners? Well, I don't know, but I am not complaining. he hehe...



Inside, the park is basically a huge bird-cage, and it is divided into different zones. Each zone is separated by a dual-pair of metal gates. Why a dual-pair? Because to prevent the bird from flying from one zone to another, or to escape from the park. The place is huge, and the map is a bit dissapointing. You don't really know where you are.

There are many species of birds in the park, about 200 species, with more than 3000 birds. Birds are flying freely, perching on trees, as close as you can get.

Mami : Yiyi, that's a peacock.

Yiyi : mmmm.....kerr.....

Mami : Yiyi, look at that bird over there. Papi, what species is that?

Papi : emmmm.....errrrr...... bird lor. Yiyi, can you say 'bird'?

Yiyi : brrr...brrr.....


Don King bird


The birds can get quite close.


The peacock was having an Hari Raya open house.

There is also a petting area, where you can have fun with some chicken, rabbits, a big emu, peacocks. But when we were there, there were only 2 sleeping rabbits, a peacock and a big emu. We didn't stayed, as Mami was afraid that the emu will attack us. After we left, we saw some workers carrying 2 cages of rabbits to the petting area.


Flamingo. They sleep, standing on one leg.


Pelican.


The environment looks like a rain forest.


Would you believe a jungle like this exists in KL?


A man-made water fall.

If you are planning to go there, few things you will need to prepare. Bring and drink lots of water. And bring an umbrella. It can be very hot in the park, especially with the hot scorching sun shining. We even saw a kid being carried out by his father, and the kid was all pale. I think the kid had a heat-stroke. Another kid had a nose-bleed because of the heat. We offered them some tissues and water to clean up.

Also bring some anti mosquito repellant, not pesticide, but the one you applied on your body. There are lots of mosquito in there, as big as house fly. I was worried for Yiyi, so we have to keep moving so that mosquitoes couldn't bite her - but it did :(

One thing I found disturbing is the attitude of some visitors. They leave their rubbish everywhere. Brochures, sweet wrappers, tissues, mineral water bottles. They just throw it everywhere and polutes the beautiful environment. Some people never learn.

It was tiring, and hot, but it was worth it. We walked through the park in about 2 hours, but we just kept moving because of the mosquitoes. We also didn't go for the various bird show because it was too hot for Yiyi. But all in all, it was a good and fun trip.