Wildlife Explorers Basecamp

Wildlife Explorers Basecamp is the San Diego Zoo's dedicated children's zone — a purpose-built space designed to make the zoo experience more hands-on and active for young visitors. Rather than just walking past enclosures, kids here can crawl through tunnels designed to replicate animal burrows, climb on rope and net structures, and get genuinely close to smaller animals through viewing windows set at child height.

The animal highlights within Basecamp include prairie dog and meerkat habitats where the animals often approach the viewing windows out of curiosity, creating face-to-face moments that feel spontaneous rather than staged. Reptile viewing areas and small animal encounters round out the wildlife interactions.

The physical play elements — tunnels, climbing nets, and exploration structures — are themed to reflect the wildlife they're designed around. A child crawling through a 'burrow' gets some physical context for how a prairie dog actually lives underground. This kind of experiential education is what the best children's museum design achieves, and the zoo has applied the same thinking here.

Basecamp is best for children ages 2-12. Older kids tend to migrate toward the main zoo animal habitats, while Basecamp's scale and activity level is calibrated for younger visitors. The zone is included in standard San Diego Zoo admission — no upcharge required.

When planning your zoo day, build Basecamp in as an active-rest zone — a place to let kids run and climb between the more passive observation sections of the zoo. It works particularly well as a midday energy outlet before pushing through the afternoon.