Suncoast Primate Sanctuary

Suncoast Primate Sanctuary (website here!) is a privately-funded non-profit organization dedicated to the rescue and rehabilitation of primates. They recently opened to the public so we took a trip over today and stopped in Tarpon Springs on the way for lunch since it's only about 10 minutes away.

I had no idea that Tarpon Springs has the highest percentage of Greek-Americans in the whole of the US. Evidently the town's population originated from about 500 Greek men who emigrated to dive for Tarpon's prolific sponges back in 1905...who knew??

We ate at Hellas - a totally fabulous Greek restaurant...

After lunch we went over to the Suncoast Primate Sunctuary. They have over 70 animals, including over 10 species of monkeys, Cheetah, the now-70 year-old chimp from the old Tarzan movies, a troupe of baboons, exotic birds and an albino Burmese python. Most of the animals were either former pets or animals used for entertainment purposes. Some had even had their teeth removed to prevent them from biting their former owners and many suffered deplorable living conditions before coming to the sanctuary.

I have never seen chimpanzees so close before. They were totally interactive since they have all grown up with humans - one of them even knows some sign language...

And on the way home, I managed to catch on film a rare sighting of daddy monkey acting out in his natural environment...