Our Trip to Paradise Wildlife Park
On an icy and very chilly Saturday, a couple of weeks ago, we headed off to Paradise Wildlife Park in Hertfordshire. This was surprisingly close to us (just under an hours drive) and due to the very chilly weather – it was very quiet! This is just how we like our tourist attractions!
Having never heard of Paradise Wildlife Park before, I was definitely keen to review it, it’s a combination of zoo animals and adventure playgrounds with some other attractions such as mini golf and soft play. We had such a fun day – Paradise Wildlife Park has surprising amount of ‘exotic’ animals alongside the usual farm animals too.
We began our day feeding the farm animals and looking at the snuggly bunnies and guinea pigs. Our favourite were the pygmy goats – Elodie wanted to take one home!
Finlay was all about going in search of the Big Cats! Unfortunately the lions were mostly choosing to be inside and not out in their enclosure (possibly due to the low temperatures). I’m never sure how I feel about zoos in general and so seeing the lions pacing in their inside enclosure was a little sad for me. However, the kids absolutely loved seeing the leopards being fed. Finlay was shouting ‘he’s eating a whole leg – how cool!’ We never did find out animal they were devouring but it was fascinating watching.
I think this is a lovely, well thought out zoo for all ages. The pathways between enclosures are very wide making it very child friendly and everything is easily accessible by buggy. There was a wealth of information about each animal to read up on in easy language that our 6 and 9 year could easily understand and read for themselves. Finlay particularly liked all the fun facts about the animals such as ‘underneath its hair, a zebra’s skin is black!’ I liked the high viewing platforms for the tiger and leopards which meant children of all ages could view with ease.
There is an Insect and Snake enclosure which has some quirky ways of viewing the insects – these were very popular with our kids – look how close Finlay could get to the cockroaches – brave!
This is Orla about to brave the tunnel that takes you next to largest snake I’ve ever seen in my life – I was so sad I couldn’t get a clear photo. Orla was pretty nervous about this but followed her siblings leave and was very chuffed with herself when she made it out of the tunnel safe and sound! Looking at this huge Anaconda, I had no doubt that they could eat a whole human alive – totally believable given the size of this thing!
I like how close you could get to some of the animals. Elodie’s second choice of a pet was a meerkat – they really were very cute. They were swinging by their lamps to get some extra warmth – I did almost think I could sneak one under my coat to keep them warm!
Orla’s favourite animals were the penguins and she was pleased as punch to see them being fed fish and waddling away to snuffle their fish in their own little homes.
Paradise Wildlife Park also has an extensive play area, a wooden mini train and opening in 2018 is a dinosaur themed land. The soft play area was super busy when we went so we braved the cold and the kiddos loved the play area. They had fun timing themselves on the obstacle course! We didn’t get a chance to try out the mini golf but it’s safe to say there is something for kids of all different ages at Paradise Wildlife Park, plenty to entertain our tribe of mixed ages! There’s lots for the animal mad folks as well as small kids that need to burn off energy in a playpark. It was a winner for our family although I think we’ll pick a warmer day next time!
*We received tickets to the park in exchange for an honest review. All words and photos are our own.*
