What It Is

Open since 1914, the Audubon Zoo is a 58-acre zoo featuring more than 1,700 local, exotic, and endangered animals from around the world.  The Audubon Zoo is part of the Audubon Nature Institute, which includes the Zoo, the Aquarium, and the Insectarium.

Where It Is

New Orleans, Louisiana

When We Went

June 2022

What We Did

We had hoped to get to the zoo when it opened at 10:00 a.m.  That meant leaving our hotel by 9:00 a.m.  It didn’t happen.  The forecast had taken an ugly turn, and it rained pretty hard at 9:00.  By 9:30, however, the rain had lightened up, and it looked as if the skies would be clear until after 12.  We decided to go for it.

We bought $3 Jazzy Passes (unlimited rides for 24 hours) from the New Orleans Regional Transit Authority and hitched a ride on the St. Charles Streetcar—the oldest continuously operating street railway in the world, according to U.S. News and World Report—which we found not far from our hotel on Canal Street.  We rode the streetcar for about 35 minutes, passing through Central Business District, the Garden District, Tulane University, and Loyola University, until we reached the St. Charles at Tulane/Loyola stop.  

From there, we followed a beautiful, tree-lined path to the zoo entrance, about a 30-minute walk.

We made it inside the park around 11:00ish and had just enough time to see the flamingos and the orangutans before it started raining again.  It didn’t stop for at least an hour.  

To be honest, we weren’t loving it.  We hadn’t been smart enough to bring umbrellas, and it got harder and harder to find dry shelters between animal exhibits once we got away from the restrooms near the front of the zoo.  We couldn’t even see any animals as we moved from dry spot to dry spot because they were hiding from the rain.

However, after we found a large, dry area near the lions, the skies cleared and we were able to enjoy the zoo.

And we definitely enjoyed the zoo.
 
How Much We Spent

I don’t have a record of what we paid for tickets, but as of 2026 you’ll pay $30-40 per adult and $25-35 per child/senior, depending on when you go.

How Much Time We Spent There

Trip Advisor and U.S. News and World Report recommend about 2-3 hours.  We were there for about 3.5 hours.  We arrived around 11:00 and left around 2:30.

What We Liked

This zoo is beautiful.  I know that zoos are supposed to be all about the animals, but at the Audubon it’s about the landscaping and architecture, too. 

This is a very green facility, and I don’t mean it’s environmentally-friendly (although I’m sure it is).  Everywhere you look there’s something lush and leafy.  Tall, stately palm trees.  Bird-friendly southern magnolias and black tupelos.  And sprawling, shady, southern live oaks.

Oh, the live oaks.

These are the trees you expect to find in an old Southern town: large, 200-year-old specimens with outstretched branches, draped in Spanish moss.  They are everywhere, and they are stunning.

But the zoo also stuns with its many fountains and water features, open areas and walking paths, white columns and colonnades, pergolas, and red-brick-lined pathways and structures.  Even the elephant house looks elegant with its brick exterior and French-farmhouse style.

Of course, the animal exhibits are pretty spectacular, too.  We loved the orangutan exhibit (my personal favorite) with its thoughtful-looking adults and adorable younglings.  We enjoyed the natural setting of the Louisiana Swamp exhibit—the world’s only urban swamp—with its wooden sidewalk over the water, abundance of alligators, and unique look at a rare white alligator.  And we spent a surprising amount of time watching a maned wolf, a beautiful red-furred fellow we’d never heard of, trotting through his expansive, grassy habitat.

There were other amazing animals, of course, including African lions, Malayan tigers, giraffes, jaguars, California sea lions, and beautiful, free-roaming peacocks.

As a bonus, the Audubon Zoo is pleasantly flat, unlike the often-steep hills of the National Zoo in Washington, D.C., which we took the kids to when they were young, and the San Diego Zoo, which we visited during our 2024 road trip.  If you’re pushing a stroller or wheelchair or trying to coax a young child to keep walking, then this is happy news.  Also, even though the National Zoo and the Audubon Zoo have roughly the same animal population, numbers-wise, the Audubon Zoo occupies only about one third of the acreage, another plus if you have kids who tire easily or if you simply don’t want to spend most of your time walking instead of observing.

What We Didn't Like

We would have enjoyed it more if it hadn’t rained.  On the other hand, because it rained, the crowds weren’t as big and the air wasn’t as hot and humid as you’d expect for Louisiana in June.


Was it worth it? 

Yes.  My husband and I briefly visited the Audubon Zoo in 2004.  We were in New Orleans for my work, and we had managed to hightail it to the zoo one afternoon between events.  Our visit then was very brief (we were literally speedwalking to our top choices in order to get back to the Convention Center on time), but we saw enough to know that the zoo was worth a second look.  Despite the rain, we’re both glad we took the time to revisit the zoo with our kids and experience it at a slower pace.  The kids loved it.


For more information, visit https://audubonnatureinstitute.org/zoo.

Did You Know?  Spanish moss is neither Spanish nor moss.  In fact, it is an “air” plant that doesn’t need soil, only the support of the cypress trees and live oak trees that it hangs from.  A relative of the pineapple, Spanish moss loves the humid, subtropical regions of the southeastern United States and gets all of its moisture and nutrients from the air and rain. 

Was It Worth It?
Audubon Zoo

​Posted June 22, 2026, by Janet Wolfe