Zoo display draws big crowd

If the crowd were any indication, the night time was the right time to be at the Hillcrest Park Zoo.

Hundreds packed the zoo on Wednesday, the second night of the city’s annual Christmas Nites at the Zoo event.

Staff photo: Kevin Wilson

Sarah Rodriquez of Clovis takes a photo of her daughter, 9-year-old Reyna Rodriquez, in a Santa cutout during Christmas Nites at the Zoo at Hillcrest Park.

The zoo will open again from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. today and Friday, and not much slowdown is expected on those nights.

“It’s still early, but it seems like we have been a little busier,” Zoo Director Vince Romero said. “We’ve had good weather, which helps.”

With little to no wind on a 45-degree night, the popular places at the light-laden zoo tended to be places with warmth or good photo opportunities.

Most people, such as Tyler Frank and Brittany Gonzales of Floyd, made the walk around the path created through roughly one-third of the zoo, then snapped a few family pictures at the tree near the exit adjacent to Sycamore Street.

The couple, engaged to be married in September, made the trip with Brittany’s 6-year-old son, Savino Gonzales.

“We liked it,” Brittany Gonzales said. “It was cute, it was something to do, it was family-oriented. It was nice.”

Savino said his favorite part was the snake exhibit, which Frank said would have been the case during normal zoo hours, too.

The most popular spot, by far, was the table where zoo employees and family members passed out free cups of hot chocolate.

“Here’s a cooler one for the kids,” said Brandi Machen, who said she’d be working at the zoo if her husband Cody hadn’t beaten her to it.

The zoo staff doesn’t keep an official count of visitors, with its only real attendance estimates tied to the cups of hot cocoa delivered. Romero said just before 7 p.m., the zoo had already exhausted its first 1,000 cups. Last year, the number for the entire event was around 1,600.

At the entrance, zoo employee Mary-Lou McAnulla was constantly stocking and restocking a small table with small plush Santas and elves for $1 each — sold at cost, she said, as a service to the families wanting a small souvenir.

“This always runs in the red, always,” McAnulla said.

The top seller, McAnulla said, was a glowing reindeer nose. Another 400 units were scheduled for arrival today, after the first 1,500 sold out.