Mill mountain zoo and the Blue Ridge Parkway.

Saturday Brian and I went to the Mill mountain zoo in Roanoke. He had never been, despite living here for the past 9 yrs and it was on my list of places to see. I have heard mixed reviews on it but we enjoyed it. It's not very large but worth a few hours.

Snow leopard

Our favorite - red panda.

Monkey

Red wolf

Gate-creshing duck

Scarlet Ibis

Billy goat

Pot belly pig

Though I loved the snow leopards (they were beautiful and really hot in this weather), we both decided the red panda was the cutest. He had such a sweet little face and just kept running around. (Brian now wants one as a pet. Me too!)
We had a look at eating there but the food was not exactly appealing. So we got a bag of kettle corn (popcorn cooked in a large metal drum) and watching the leopards and red panda (who we think was eyeing out kettle corn).
The only real disappointment was the wolverine, who was hiding, despite the fact we went back to his enclosure 3-4 times.

Then we headed over the Star. It's a large metal star (largest in the world) set up on the mountain and it's lit at night, which I am looking forward to seeing. However even unlit, the view of Roanoke from there is pretty nice.

Roanoke star 

View over Roanoke from under the star

After this we headed up to the Blue ridge Parkway for a drive. It is beautiful there and I am looking forward to going back and seeing more.

Blue ridge Parkway

View from Iron Mine hollow, elevation = 2372m 

It was a lovely drive and there were lots of bikes (I was really jealous as it would be amazing to drive along there on a bike). And some cyclists, including a woman who had so many sandal bags, she seemed to be moved everything she owned.

After a lovely drive, we headed back to Roanoke for dinner (Brian cooked fish - it was really good). Then sat with a few bottles of wine and watched movies, though we talked over all of them. :-)