A Day at Temaiken

Come with us for a day at Temaiken. This is a zoo and ecological park about 40 minutes outside of Buenos Aires. We went on a weekday when it was cold and kind of misting out and there was almost no one there, it was incredible!

A Day at Temaiken | Exploring the Park

Temaiken is absolutely massive. There are Caribbean flamingos at the very front of the park and my kids were obsessed. They could have stayed here the entire time. We went on to see the African pelicans, which were huge and kind of looked like dinosaurs.

There were a lot of really large enclosures with African savannah animals, including a few zebras that were fighting like siblings, which I got a kick out of. One of the incredible things about this place is the architecture and the design for every enclosure and all of the walking spaces. Everything was so incredibly intentional and very beautiful. I feel like it worked really well with the natural landscape and there was a lot of space dedicated to each animal. We got see jaguars and a bengal tiger, which you don't see very often.

There is an aquatic life area with mostly freshwater creatures. At home in Tennessee, we have the largest freshwater aquarium in the US so while this was cool, it just didn't compare to home.

I could have stayed all day in the middle section of the park. It was so peaceful and gorgeous.

As we walked we came upon the wallaby enclosure. We were very intrigued so of course we had walk around. At first, there was nothing there and then we turned the corner and there were two wallabies. One of them appears to be albino which was super cool. There were also llamas and tapirs, a Mesopotamia area which had a lot of fish and islands that had black swans, and lemurs just hanging out.

I really can't even put into words how incredible the design and architecture is. There was an area where you could see a puma, but then there's a rock cave next to it and you can go in and see dinosaur bones that have been excavated in Patagonia, which is here in Argentina. They've also found the largest dinosaur ever in Argentina. So you're able to learn about the dinosaur while also seeing the puma at eye level through windows in the cave.

There were also so many playgrounds and so many parks for the kids to play along the way. We ended up staying in one specific playground area with the kids because there were a bunch of school groups there and I just wanted to keep them out of the chaos. This was a really fun spot for them. There were all these little tunnels they loved to play in and even a spot where you can pop up like a meerkat would. It was a fun, really cool little activity and spot where we could take a break.

A Day at Temaiken | Birds, Bats and Burgers

Tucked back in a corner of the park is the bird area. This is by far the coolest part of the entire park, hands down. As you can see from the map, there are several locations where you can walk through enclosures with the birds.

They had American flamingos here which are very different looking from the Caribbean flamingos. They're lighter, more pink instead of orange, and smaller.

At the first bird enclosure we saw swans and pelicans that were just hanging out. We definitely had to watch out for the bird poop, but it was really cool to be very close to these birds. 

We saw peacocks that were more vibrant in color than any I'm used to. There's another section that was just macaws and parrots, and it looked like you could theoretically walk through but considering that no one else was, I didn't want to risk breaking any rules. The macaws have taken over the space and they were very loud, but it was so cool to see them. At the end of that area, there were also some scarlet ibises and a pink spoonbill.

We moved on to the last section where you could walk around with the birds. There were a few specific birds that were kept separate from all the other ones I think because think they're a little bit more aggressive, but for the most part we were able to see them close up.

We doubled back and found the bat enclosure, which was absolutely amazing. You can view it from the outside or you can go into it. It was very hot and humid and smelled pretty bad, so we got through that part pretty quickly.

By this time, it was around 1:00 and we were hungry. We wandered around for a while and finally found a little place called Trixie’s that was labeled on the map as having a gluten free options. Trixie's is American themed restaurant that had really great music playing and a cute little playground in the back. They had a gluten free burger which the baby and I shared.

Ironically, outside of the restaurant were goats, baby cows and adult jersey cows.

By this time we were done and ready to go home. It was absolutely incredible and I will definitely be taking the kids back here. It was worth the 40 minute drive!