Zooquarium Is Closing!

Capecodonline.com — Nearly 45 years after opening, ZooQuarium, the iconic, kid-friendly petting zoo and aquarium on Route 28, has closed.

“It’s been a labor of love,” said Dennis Markham, who ran the facility built by his wife’s father and another man in 1969. “It’s a hard thing to do.”

Markham, his wife and her brother decided to sell the property earlier this year, he said. The doors closed Dec. 1.

“We just decided that’s enough,” Markham, 65, said. “Everything catches up to you when you’re aging.”

Almost all of the animals who lived on the property have been moved to farms and other animal centers on the East Coast, Markham said.

Do you think they mean that all the animals have really been moved to farms? Or is Dennis Markham giving us the parent who put down the dog routine and all the animals were “sent to the farm” wink, wink? I legit thought my childhood dog was sent to a farm in Vermont until I was like twenty three years old, when my friends finally filled me in I was devastated.

Did anyone actually go to the Zooquarium growing up or was it just for tourists? Seems like such a tourist thing to do. Come to Cape Cod and go look at a tied up goat and some crabs in a fish tank. I’m not saying we din’t go to the aquarium growing up, it’s just that we called it the beach, and the petting zoo was our Portuguese neighbors backyard.

P.S. Now that I’ve read this Zooquarium story I will be singing the radio jingle song in my head all day. Does everyone else remember what I’m talking about? UPDATE: Here is the Zooquarium song!