Earlier this month, Emmily Austin of Jefferson, Maine visited the Franklin Park Zoo in Boston with her five-week-old son Canyon. While there, Emmily and Canyon caught the attention of Kiki the gorilla.
Kiki also happens to be raising a young one, as she had her fifth baby Pablo last October.
Emmily noticed that Kiki kept looking their way. She told News Center Maine, "She kept looking around the corner of the cave. I was like, 'She's looking at Canyon.' I was holding him up to the glass, and was like 'Yeah look, it's my baby.' And was like, 'How cool would it be if she came to see him?' I had said that several times but I wasn't really expecting it."
And not only was Kiki looking, she was completely enamored. Emmily's husband Michael broke out the video camera and recorded the amazing encounter, posting it to YouTube.
Emmily said, "It was so sweet. For like well over five minutes she just sat there watching him and just staring at him so lovingly."
Though Canyon slept through the entire encounter, Emmily hopes to go back to the zoo soon and hopefully rekindle the relationship with Kiki.
She said, "When I walked into the zoo that day, I never could've imagined that we'd have this experience. It was so beautiful and we walked out over the moon. And we had so many people stop us and tell us that was the most beautiful thing we've ever watched. And it was so touching, it really was. You could feel the emotions were just in the air."
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