Detroit zoo

The Detroit Zoo is home to the National Amphibian Conservation Center so it has a fantastic amphibian house. It's laid out so well but what is most impressive and something I think they really excel at is the sheer amount of volunteers they have on hand... On weekdays, we have been to this zoo many times and it is pretty constant and almost every time we have visited it has been during the week. The volunteers are very knowledgable and have always taught us something.

The other exhibit we always make a point to visit is the Arctic Ring of Life, it is a fantastic polar bear exhibit because the polar bears are lively! We've never visited when the bears have not been crawling, sitting on or swimming above the tunnel. This time we were lucky enough to see the bear attempting to hunt a seal through glass. My kids loved this. We almost missed it as the bear had been above water and dove in as we were leaving. 

Overall, we really appreciate the Detroit Zoo for being clean and well laid out. It takes a full day to get through but there is a lot to see. We had a membership to the zoo when we lived in Michigan and always make it a point to come back.

My one complaint was the box office trying to "upsell" us on tickets going in. There are signs all over for upgrading tickets to watch movies and ride trains or carousels. I'm not a fan of forced upgrades and had we upgraded our ticket we would have missed some animals as we were there the entire day. Furthermore, the person selling tickets never told us if those tickets were discounted with our AZA reciprocal membership.

Outside of that issue I would rate the Detroit Zoo a 9/10 because of the well designed exhibits and focus on amphibians as well as education.