I am flying on Friday to San Diego for a meeting, but will stay until Sunday morning so I can revisit San Diego. I've been to the zoo many times, but never to the Wild Animal Park. Is it worth it? The zoo is incredible, and I would be happy revisiting, but will gladly visit the Wild Animal Park if it ranks a 6 or 7 out of 10 (and I rank the zoo as a 10 as far as zoos go).

Michael

Michael - where are you staying and will you have a car?

I think you'd really like it! Wherever you're staying, you'll need a car, and you want to get there as early as you can in the summer - it gets hot out there late in the day. Have fun!

I haven't booked a hotel yet, but likely will stay near the airport (since I have a 6:45am flight on Sunday). But, on Saturday, my body will be on NY time, so it won't be difficult to wake up very early and get to the park while its (relatively) cool.

It will be hot out there by 10am this time of year. Be sure to have a lot of fluids to drink - it is very dry as well. From the airport to the park it is about a 40-45 minute drive. Once there, lots of walking as well. We haven't been there in a long time and I believe the mono-rail has changed, but we took it in the past and that was a fun thing to do.

I would do one of the private tours where you get close up to the giraffes and rhinos. Costly but worth it. Definitely agree that it will be very hot

The monorail no longer exists, much to the disgust of some annual pass holders. There is now a tour in a more limited area of the park in a sort of truck-pulled train. I'm not sure if it's included with admission.

We thought it was just ok. Maybe 5-6 on a scale of 10.

We did not take the more indepth tour. Perhaps that would have made a difference.

Also, go early or go late if you want to see a lot of the animals doing more than hiding and sleeping. They don't like the heat anymore than you will.

My sister just returned from San Diego last weekend. Her family went to the Wild Animal Park. They LOVED it! They took the $90 per person "Photo Tour" of Asia. On the day they were free, Africa was totally booked, so they did Asia. However, since they were the last tour of the day, their driver also drove through Africa on the return and let them feed her final bag of leaves to the giraffes. My sister reported being up close with the newborn rhino, 10 lion cubs, and the newborn giraffe.