The song had to be tweaked a little: Daddy's taking us to the zoo became Papy's taking us. But to the zoo we went.
Salut!'s Paris correspondents will need to fill in detail of comparison between the respective zoos of the French capital and London. I have not been to the zoo in the Bois de Vincennes; we were in London so it was to Regent's Park, for the first time in many years, that we went.
After being stung badly on a visit to Kew Gardens when last back in the UK, I knew it was not going to be cheap. Even so, I was slightly taken aback when the friendly young man at the car park kiosk totted it all up to £92. That includes a whacking £13 for the car park, two adult daughters at the full rate - £20.50 each - and two, er, concessions, the concession being all of £1.50 a head. What a good job Maya was two days short of her third birthday and went in free.
Inside, there was a rip-off cash machine and the same exhorbitant prices we'd encountered at Kew. £1.10 for a small packet of crisps, £7.20 for fish and chips served in cardboard boxes.
It is not difficult, in the current climate, to work out why the charges should be so high. Nor is it hard to conclude that they are pitched at such a level as to exclude a large number of families from much hope of experiencing what it a great London resource.
So we were ripped off in a good cause. The zoo is magnificent, beautifully laid out with animal enclosures that look big and well-designed enough to make for happy residents, not that it is possible to pose the question.
I was as impressed by the small - ants carrying huge leaves, by comparison with their own sizes, along branches - as I was by the mighty lions, only two of which were readily visible.
Maya loved the flamingos and they did present an elegant spectacle. She liked the black-capped squirrel monkeys from Bolivia, too, but would probably stick to Peppa Pig rather than hurry for another look at London Zoo's bigger, uglier bearded (and non-bearded) varieties.
It rained a lot so the roundabout - which Maya, fresh from several weeks in France, insists on calling le manège - seemed to have come to a halt nearly every time we passed nearby. When we did find it working, Maya froze at the last moment and refused to go. That saved us £2.50.
We spent three hours there and could, on a nicer day, have lingered longer without risk of getting bored. But perhaps they need a special addition to the living creatures on display: a loan shark or two to make it possible to pay a return visit.
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