re: What are your favorite zoos ?

We went to Orange Beach over Thanksgiving and went to the Gulf Coast Zoo in Gulf Shores. (It was the subject of a former Animal Planet series - The Little Zoo that Could) It is certainly not a big zoo and doesn’t have spectacular landscaping. However, it was old school and very interactive. You could buy food to feed the animals, pay a little extra and hold baby kangaroos, feed sloths, or play with the lemurs. My college age kids had so much fun that they went back the next day. The staff is really friendly and have a great love for all the animals there.