CREATE NEW WILD HOLIDAY TRADITIONS AT THE SAN DIEGO ZOO

Celebrate the Season with the Animals Dec.10-Jan.2

            Many of the familiar holiday traditions will get a wild-animal twist during the San Diego Zoo’s Jungle Bells celebration. During the three-week event, the Zoo will be transformed with a holiday makeover, and animal magnetism will take holiday traditions to the next level.

           Jungle Bells runs Dec. 10, 2010, through Jan. 2, 2011, and will feature flurries of snow, the twinkling of lights and the melodious sounds of a hand-bell choir. During the celebration, grounds will stay open until 8 p.m., three hours past the usual closing time. (The only day the celebration will close early during the three weeks is Dec. 24, as Santa said he had to leave early that day.)

            Highlights of the celebration will include the “Wizards of Winter,” aka the SPLASH painters, who will create holiday animals twice nightly in Wegeforth Bowl, and the acrobatic Jumpin’ Jammin’ Elves, who use a trampoline in Urban Jungle to launch themselves into the sky where they twist and flip to holiday tunes. Guests can also get their noses painted just like Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer.

Among the many ways that holiday traditions will get wild during Jungle Bells: lights will be shaped like animals, Candy Cane Lane will lead to the Treehouse "Blitzen" Light Experience, and Santa’s workshop will be steps from snakes, lizards and turtles. Skyfari, which takes guests over the Zoo, will be updated with a Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer theme, the “Reindeer Express” bus will take guests on a tour of the lights, and Dr. Zoolittle’s show in the Children’s Zoo will be an animal play on “ ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas.” The Zoo’s talented chefs will be cooking up some holiday treats to put guests’ taste buds in a holiday spirit as well!

             For those looking for the wildest of holiday Zoo experiences, there will be “Animal Magic for the Holidays” – special surprise encounters in Discovery Outpost with our animal-world friends – from 4 to 8 p.m. daily.

Jungle Bells is free with paid admission to the San Diego Zoo.