Cincinnati Walks for Kids

Last weekend, I participated in my first charity walk.  My husband is a Building Systems Group Engineer for Messer Construction, and he is currently stationed at Cincinnati Children's Hospital, which is ranked in the top 3 of children's hospitals nationwide and is #1 for cancer care.  Messer has an ongoing relationship with Children's, and they were the top fundraiser (by like $10K!) for Cincinnati Walks for Kids. This event involved a scenic stroll through the Cincinnati Zoo to celebrate and raise money for the hospital.

So, first things first, we went to get checked in.

We received t-shirts for walking, but we were rocking these neon shirts to represent Messer throughout the walk.

Since Messer was the top fund-raiser, we were the first group to cross the Start line and lead everyone in to the zoo.  

 

After finishing the walk, all of the walkers had the zoo to ourselves to enjoy. It was kind of a shame that it was at the zoo this year since (a) I was just there the week prior and (b) I heard that last year's walk was at Coney Island, and I haven't been there yet!  But on the whole, I'm a fan of zoos, so we took advantage of being there and walked around to check out our favorite animals.  

The animals were decidedly more sleepy than they were the last time we were there. 

We spent some time watching the gorillas, which appear to now be Francisco's favorite animal. The silverback was out this time - we hadn't seen him last week.  Sadly, the baby gorilla (whom we learned is named Gladyss) was not out; I was hoping to see her last time. The zookeeper did talk about her during the gorilla presentation though and explained that Gladyss had come from a different zoo where her mother didn't know how to take care of her. The zookeepers dressed and acted as gorillas while they cared for Gladyss until she was ready to be introduced to the rest of the gorilla population.     

 

We were starved by the time it was over, so we decided to go home and try our hand at building a fire in the backyard with the grand plan of having drinks and roasting hot dogs and making s'mores. I think less stale marshmallows will improve this experience next time!