Review of the Knoxville, TN Zoo

Bedtime with the Beasts

I recently had the opportunity to accompany my daughter's Brownie Troop to the Knoxville Zoo in Knoxville, Tennessee, for their Bedtime with the Beasts program. The program is for small groups, 15 to 25, ages 6 and up, and the cost is $35 per person. The cost does include admission for the night of the tour, as well as all day admission the next day, and includes parking. The tour begins at 6:00 p.m. and ends at 9:30 a.m. the following morning.
We arrived at the back gate on a Saturday evening at 6:00 p.m. Our two guides for the program met us, and led us to the room where we would be spending the night. We unloaded our sleeping bags and overnight cases, and started our tour.

The main point of the Bedtime with the Beasts program is an evening and late-night tour of the zoo. We were able to see the animals, using only flashlights provided by the guides. This way, the animals weren't "hiding" from the normally large groups of people outside their cages.
Our tour started with the amphibians. We learned what snakes are poisonous in Tennessee (Timber Rattlesnake and Northern Copperhead). We got to spend some time with the rare white alligator. One of the exhibits that the children really loved was Zoo Spy, which is an exhibit of bugs, rats, bats, all the things that the mothers didn't want to see.

After our initial evening tour, we gathered back at the cabin for a snack of homemade trail mix and lemonade. The girls were able to see a chinchilla and watch him bath in dust, because chinchillas aren't supposed to get wet.