Jardin Zoologico de la Habana, Havana Zoo, Cuba

The Jardin Zoologico is a Zoo centrally located in the Vedado area of Havana, Cuba. The admission to the zoo is 3cuc, but you may be able to get in for free if it is a Cuban holiday. Don’t go expecting modern facilities or to see extremely rare animals, go because this zoo is frozen in the 60’s, and will provide a really unique zoo experience.

The zoo has a decent selection of animals, but nothing out of the ordinary. The thing that stands out though, is that at this zoo you can get as close to the animals as you want. Unlike other zoos I have been to where there is some sort of barrier and then the cage, here you can get as close to the actual cage as you want, for better or for worse. If you have a child you want to be extra cautious here. There were vertical gaps 2ft wide in the fence around the hippo habitat and I saw a Cuban kid learning over the railing to get a better view of the rhino below.

You need to be careful here, because I didn’t see any zookeepers or employees around to assist if someone got snagged by one of the chimps reaching through his cage or fell into the rhino pit. There was also nobody to monitor the patrons. I witnessed everything from people throwing fruit at the orangutans, not to them, to a man popping his hand in and out of a pacing jaguar’s cage. Even the animals there were taunting one another. A group of monkeys and a hippo shared a habitat, and the monkeys would sneak behind the hippo and pull its tail to the cheers of the visitors.

The experience is a little depressing, seeing animals in concrete enclosures with nothing around resembling a natural environment, but at the same time it is nothing like any zoo I have ever experienced. If you are really sensitive about animal, which is understandable, I wouldn’t recommend going because you will get upset, but if you want a crazy experience, and possibly a run in with an escaped animal, or just want to see what a zoo looked like in the 60’s, I would definitely recommend this.

Havana Garden Zoo Map