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Zoo spokesperson Pamela Baker-Masson said she met visitors Friday from North Carolina and others from Pittsburgh who trekked just to see the giant pandas, in addition to their regulars.

\"The panda cub is definitely a star attraction, but overall, the sense that I have from our visitors is that they’re just happy to be able to return to the Zoo, enjoy the time outdoors with their families and see all the animals,\" Baker-Masson said in a statement to ABC News, noting the zoo's reopening appropriately falls on Endangered Species Day.

\"We’ve opened with many safety precautions in place, but it certainly feels like we’re returning to our new normal,\" she said.

The public got to pick Xiao Qi Ji's name back in November and, as part of a cooperative agreement with China to breed the \"vulnerable\" species in their native land, he will be returned there when he's 4 years old to join his three siblings: Bei Bei, Bao Bao and Tai Shan.

\"PHOTO:
Courtesy National Zoo
PHOTO: From nose to tail tip, the 5-week-old giant panda cub Xiao Qi Ji measured 13.9 inches (its tail accounted for two of those inches), Sept. 25, 2020, at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C.
>
\"PHOTO:
Drew Angerer/Getty Images
PHOTO: Nine-month-old male giant panda cub Xiao Qi Ji climbs in a tree at the Smithsonian National Zoon on May 19, 2021, in Washington, D.C.
>

Until then, to the delight of tens of thousands of tourists, he'll be the zoo's star attraction, and the focus of possibly a million impossibly cute photos.

Maybe even more.

\"PHOTO:Giant
Jack Gruber-USA TODAY Network
PHOTO:Giant Panda Xiao Qi Ji, left, celebrates his 9-month birthday with his mother Mei Xiang, 22 years of age, as visitors make their return to the Smithsonian National Zoo on May 21, 2021 in Washington.
>

ABC News' Tom Dunlavey contributed to this report.

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