Of course, with 2 days at Zoo Berlin to see the pandas, there was also some time to see everything else! I think there have only been two changes since my last visit in 2020 and those are the new Empire of Cats section, which opened in 2022 – as well as pandas I really like cats so was looking forward to checking that out – and also the Rhino Pagoda, which opened in 2023. These two new spaces, along with the relatively new World of Birds house, really do give the zoo new vibes. On this trip I also decided I’d probably quite like to come back to Zoo Berlin again this year, so decided to get myself a membership – I opted for the Zoo-only option (instead of Zoo plus Aquarium) which cost €63 for an adult pass. With a 1-day ticket costing €25, the pass pays for itself on the third visit, and I made 2 visits on this trip alone – I think I’ve given myself the challenge of seeing how many times I can visit in the next year!
Rhino Pagoda – I had seen photos of the outside of the tall front entrance to the pagoda online and was quite impressed by that, I really had no idea what it was like inside before going, and it really impressed me a lot! On walking up to the pagoda there are tapirs on the left and rhinos on the left, the outdoors spaces are beautiful and spread around the outside of the pagoda, where you can also see Visayan warty pigs who share space with the rhinos. Inside, after stepping through the lofty heights of the entrance, is a circular space with indoor room for all the animals living here. The rhinos have the largest space with a large waterfall into a pond, it’s great to see them below the water level too. It’s a luscious green environment and I really like this addition to the zoo.
Empire of Cats – another modern and beautifully designed new space for the zoo. Currently there are also some large cats living around the house, however there is work ongoing on another new cat area next to Empire of Cats where large cats will be (at the minute I only remember tigers on the list as going there, but there were a few others too). So on the outside of this house you can see the lions and tigers (Amur), and at least at the tiger side there are also windows on the inside where you can look out, when we were there we were lucky and a tiger was right up leaning against the window! Inside you can also see both indoor and outdoor spaces for the leopard, I think it’s been a long time since I’ve seen a leopard, here you can be so close to see all the detail in the coat pattern and just look at those huge paws! It was also great to see the sand cats so active, I think there were 3 of them on my visit and they were running around and interacting, fab to see, I’ve only seen sand cats a handful of times so this was a great experience – they’re over 2 or 3 spaces in the house with different terrain and enrichment options in each one so they have lots of different options for activities. And also great to see the margay, I’m not sure I’ve seen one before, or if I have, it’s been a long time. They do have an outdoor yard as well and we spent ages trying to spot it outside before heading inside, and here it was sitting all nice right in the middle XD A super cute small cat, those long whiskers are amazing.
Something we do seem to have missed was the Creatures of the Night section which is in the basement of the Empire of Cats, I’m not sure how we didn’t see this, but hey, gives me something new for next time! The list of animals living here is huge so plenty to see, I would especially like to see the aardvarks (something I’ve now seen on a later trip to the US) and the rusty spotted cat, they look beautiful
