Days Out...

Chester Zoo

Yesterday, I took Aum and his friend Alex to Chester Zoo for the day. It is years since I have been, so I was quite curious to see how it had changed. We arrived at around 11.30am, and I was pleasantly surprised at the prices - it was £41.50 for the three of us, only fractionally more than Blue Planet Aquarium, and it took us three times as long to do and we still didn't see everything so was definitely better value for money.

We started with the elephants and took some photos before going across Elephant Bridge to see the giraffes and go through 'Butterfly Journey' which is new since I last came. You walk through a huge greenhouse and there are hundreds of butterflies flitting around - some were bigger than my hand! Afterwards we went on to the latest attraction: Dinosaurs Bite Back! This area had loads of model dinosaurs (some life size) that moved and made noises; some even spat water when you walked past.

We went for some lunch in June's Pavilion, I had half a chicken, mushroom and sweetcorn pizza, and the boys shared a margarita. They were huge so we probably should have just shared one between us, but I just ate a lot more than usual to make up for it!

After lunch we saw the penguins, lions, orangutans and chimpanzees, jaguars and lemurs before stopping again for a rest, this time for me to have a cup of tea and the boys to get candyfloss (which they had been pestering for all day!). Next we went across Bat's Bridge to do the other side of the park - bears, zebra, rhinos, bushdogs and hoofed animals, monkeys and one of my favourites: the bat cave. This is a cave completely in the dark, where the bats have free realm - sometimes you feel them skim your head, and I got one right in my face! I was surprised that the boys weren't at all scared, bit it was probably a good thing, as trying to guide three people in the darkness with my clumsiness wouldn't be the best.

There were a few animals that we missed out as we didn't really have enough time, including the meercats, tigers and otters, and we couldn't see any rhinos! The park was really busy with it being the last week of the school holidays and quite a sunny day, so really crowded bits we didn't bother with.

We ended in the gift shop of course, and then drove home, which took forever as we were queuing to get out of the car park for forty minutes. It was a really enjoyable day though, and the boys were good as gold - no lost children today!