Siberian Tigers

Leaving Hailaer on the overnight train, we arrived in Harbin for a day. The main goal was to see the Siberian Tiger Park and Breeding Center.  I didn't have high hopes and was anticipating a few sad looking tigers. I was happily wrong.

The main part of the visit involves getting in a bus and driving through the park to see the animals in their "habitat."

....and now we're locked in our bus driving through the park.

And the tigers just start walking around and checking us out. Some of them climb up and stick their faces right onto the side of the bus.

The park also breeds African lions.

After the bus ride, you are encouraged to purchase an animal to feed to the tigers.  Turns out since we arrived at the end of the day, they had already eaten.

A tiger amongst the remants of a former animal (my bet is chicken!).

The second half of the tour allowed us to walk through the more traditional zoo part of the breeding center.  Turns out the center has over 1,000 tigers on site!  The challenge isn't breeding them, but actually getting them back into the wild.

Tigers nap in all kinds of positions.

So, I have to say that I know understand why tigers are revered.  They are absolutely beautiful in every way. The way they look, move, stare...EVERYTHING.  I'm a fan!

A white tiger!

The center also has many of the other "cats."  I always thought that ligers were fake, but according to Wikipedia they do exist.  A liger has a male lion father and a female tiger mother.  Vice versa for the tigon.  The liger was no out of it's house so we didn't see it.

Another big lion, but we also saw leopards, lynx, puma...name a big cat, we say it.

Jaguar!  Ok, so I left the park inspired by these cats.  Perhaps someone will say that I shouldn't have spent money supporting this center from keeping the animals in captivity.....but I learned a lot and have a new appreciation for these animals.