Have you ever wondered what it would be like to have a camel stick its head through your car window? If you haven’t that’s okay, I haven’t either. That is, until I went to The Exotic Resort Zoo. And let me tell you, while having a camel stick its head in the car window was a bit terrifying, the drive-through zoo was totally awesome.

When my friend, and CPHS alumna, Ashley Poulsen first asked me to go with her to a drive-through zoo, I have to admit I was a little skeptical. It just sounded like riding in a hot car with weird animal smells. Not to mention random animals that come in your window to invade your personal space while you feed them food. After going there, I discovered that it was exactly that! However, the hot car ride and weird smells were totally worth it for the great experience that I had.

The Exotic Resort Zoo is a bit of a drive being at about 1 hour and 15 minutes, but time flies by when you have good company and a good playlist. When first arriving, I was glad to see that the zoo had a fast and efficient system to get people in, despite the large number of cars in line. One thing I would recommend is buying your tickets in advance because it makes the process go even quicker, not to mention it is contactless. I will say, however, that the tickets are a bit pricey. It is $16.95 for those above the age of 12 so you may have to shake out your piggy bank for this one.

After getting our bags of food for $6 each and checking in at the entrance, we were ready to go on our great adventure. Starting off, I was a little nervous because I could see some of the animals were sticking their faces up really close to the windows and I didn’t know how I felt about having an animal coming all the way up to me in the window. As it turned out, animals getting close to the windows was the least of my worries. In the first five minutes a camel, instead of just getting really close to the window, decided to stick his entire head right THROUGH the window, practically out the other side. Not only that but he tried to make a break for our bag of feed, and in the process of getting it away, the bag exploded animal food all over Ashley in the driver’s seat. Legend has it that she is still finding bits of feed in her car to this day.

Now you might be thinking that sounds terrible, but for us, it was hilarious! That was just part of the reason why I loved the drive-through zoo. It was an hour of funny animals and laughing with friends. Totally worth a little, or even a lot of animal feed in your car.

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After the camel incident, everything was great. There were plenty of animals that ranged from funny to just downright adorable. Some were scary though, like the ostriches. If you have never seen an ostrich coming towards your car window, it kind of feels as though you are being stared down by a careful and calculating dinosaur. Last but not least, one of my favorite parts was seeing the zebras. You are not supposed to feed them because they might bite your hand which would be bad, so the zebras have learned to just open their mouths and people will throw food into them. And that is exactly what we did. It was so cool to even just see the zebra up that close not to mention be able to feed it.

Though the drive through lasted an hour, it felt like it went by so fast probably because time flies when you’re having fun. Before I knew it we were headed home with huge smiles and great memories.

Overall, the zoo is definitely worth it. The only downsides would be the cost and the long drive to get there. Other than that, this experience was not only loads of fun, but also helped me to get off my phone and get out of the house for a change. For those that are concerned with social distancing, the drive through zoo is a great way to have an enjoyable time while also keeping safe from COVID-19.

For anyone interested in going, The Exotic Resort Zoo is located in Johnson City, Texas and is open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. everyday. To buy tickets you can click here to go to their website.