THE LIVING COAST

Before I start on this post I wanted to share a recent discovery. I have always wanted my posts to look at professional as possible, but I have no idea about markup or HTML etc. However, the other day I was reading this post:

I'm Now A Full-Time Steemian!

In this post @teamsteem mentions Markdownpad.

This is a Markdown editor for Windows. I have no experience with this, or any other editor but I found it really easy to use and adds more of a professional feel to my post. I am sure I haven't used all the functionality yet but I will continue to try and improve and we will see how it goes.

There is a paid version with additional functionality but I am starting off with the free version and I will upgrade if needed.

Back to the Living Coast

So, to the main reason for the post. We have recently returned from a short trip to Devon. My daughter has just finished school and we wanted a few days away. My daughter loves animals (as do we), so we decided to spend a day at the Living Coast.

Living Coasts advertises as an 'innovative coastal zoo and aquarium where you can take a journey around the coasts of the world and see amazing animals in naturalistic habitats.'

Despite awful weather, it did not disappoint.

After you enter and pay, there is a brief history of the local area etc as well as some information about the conservation work that they do.

Then its onto the penguins!! But before that, a warning sign!

There are several breeds of penguin at Living Coast but they share an enclosure.

There are also several other birds in the same enclosure.

This one was particularly entertaining as it continuously tried to eat a small fish (a sprat) that the penguins had left. This was slightly too big for it and it kept dropping it. I don't think it managed it the whole time we were there.

This one was particularly friendly and allowed us to approach really close.

There were several other types of birds in the same enclosure, mainly wading birds like this one.

This one was nesting but you could still get really close.

The main event was the penguin feeding.

There were several reminders that smoking was not allowed anywhere on the premesis.

There was one particular penguin who stole the show.

She was called Mrs Slick on account of her slicked back hairstyle (obviously not hair!!). Apparently there used to be a Mr Slick also and they were a couple. he sadly dies a couple of years ago but Mrs Slick has a new partner!!

When the keepers came over with their buckets, many of the penguins came waddling over.

But others preferred to be hand fed.

It was great to see the penguins this close up. There was a lot more to the centre and having sorted out the photos I took, I have realised that there are far too many for a single post, so Ill split them over two posts. Ill aim to put up the second post up tomorrow. It has been difficult to select from the hundreds of pictures I took but I hope you enjoy.

Pictures taken using a Nikon D3400 18-55mm

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