San Diego Zoo Safari Park in Escondido: Africa Tram, Savanna Herds and Walkabout

Located thirty-five miles northeast of downtown San Diego in the sun-drenched San Pasqual Valley near Escondido, the San Diego Zoo Safari Park (formerly known as the Wild Animal Park) is a completely different experience from its sister urban zoo in Balboa Park. Spanning eighteen hundred acres, roughly eighteen times the footprint of the downtown San Diego Zoo, this vast sanctuary was created in 1972 as a breeding and conservation preserve where herds of giraffes, rhinos, antelopes, and zebras roam multi-acre open valley pastures together rather than sitting in individual urban exhibits. Because the park sits inland where summer afternoons get significantly warmer and walking paths stretch across wide hillsides, planning your morning strategy is essential.

The Included Africa Tram vs Paid Caravan Safaris

When you walk through the main entrance past Nairobi Village and the flamingo lagoon, make your very first stop the Africa Tram station at the bottom of the hill. This twenty-five-minute guided open-air tram tour is 100% included free with your standard admission ticket. Riding along the perimeter track around the massive central East Africa and South Africa field enclosures lets you see towering Reticulated and Masai giraffes, southern white rhinos, greater one-horned rhinos, cape buffalo, wildebeest, and rare Uganda kob grazing across the valley floor.

Because the Africa Tram line builds up by midday and animals are most active during the cooler morning hours, head straight down to the tram loading dock right after park opening (or reserve an upgraded open-bed Wildlife Safari Truck, cart tour, or overhead Flightline Safari zipline if you want to roll directly inside the savanna pastures to see giraffes up close).

Key Walking Trails: Tiger Trail, Walkabout Australia and Elephant Valley

While over half of the Safari Park consists of untouched native coastal sage scrub reserve and wide savanna fields, the pedestrian walking trails around the valley rim showcase specialized immersive zones:

• Tiger Trail (Sumatran Tigers): Winding through a shaded bamboo forest and Indonesian longhouse complex, this trail puts you inches away from critically endangered Sumatran tigers swimming against glass walls or resting on cooled rocks.
• Walkabout Australia: One of the most unique experiences in California: you walk through a double-gated kangaroo pasture along an open path with no fences between you and grazing western gray kangaroos and red-necked wallabies, alongside a neighbouring nocturnal house and one of the only platypuses residing outside Australia.
• Lion Camp, Gorilla Forest and Condor Ridge: Watch the African lion pride rest directly against the viewing glass at Lion Camp, visit the hillside aviaries of Condor Ridge (home to endangered California condors bred from extinction back in the 1980s at this very park), and observe the African savanna elephant herd across the valley floor.

How to Get to Escondido and Beat the Inland Heat

Because the San Pasqual Valley sits well inland off Interstate 15 and State Route 78, temperatures here regularly run ten to fifteen degrees Fahrenheit warmer than the coast. Wear a sun hat, carry a refillable water bottle, and wear sturdy walking sneakers. Driving takes about forty to forty-five minutes from downtown via I-15 North to Via Rancho Parkway; public transit takes longer (MTS Rapid 235 from Santa Fe Depot to Escondido Transit Center, followed by NCTD Breeze Bus 371).