Woburn Safari Park Review
Reviewed by Katy Hart
Woburn Safari Park is approximately 1 hour drive from London, Oxford, Cambridge and Birmingham and is only accessible by car. It is clearly signposted from J13 of the M1 and also from the A5 following signs to Woburn village.
The park opened in 1970 and the Game Reserve itself covers over 300 acres of beautiful parkland.
Opening times vary during the year but from 25 March to 14 October the park is open daily from 10am -5pm, closing at 6pm.
The excitement was building in our car as we made our way down the entrance drive seeing Bison, Bactrian Camel, and the rare Przewalski’s Horse before we’d even started the safari. After a welcome stop at the toilet facilities (which were beautifully clean) we queued to enter the safari park.
We’d picked a beautiful warm, spring day to visit and the queues to enter were quite long, however they moved quickly and staff were friendly and welcoming.
The safari park itself was fantastic. You can take as long as you like going around, and can stop and pause to watch the animals as the road has two lanes, giving plenty of opportunity for those wanting to get round more quickly the chance to pass you and continue their safari.
The parkland is extensive and beautifully maintained – with plenty of grazing animals the grass looked well cared for and manicured. One could almost imagine being in the plains of Central and South Africa as the sun beat down on us and we gazed out onto a herd of Southern White Rhino, sporting the most magnificent of horns. There was plenty of opportunity to get up close and photograph these animals – and it was so good to be able to see them roaming within their large enclosure freely. In with the Rhino were Eland and Wildebeest and other African grassland animals.
From the African grasslands you enter Asia and the home of the Amur Tigers. These were easy to spot but were very quiet basking in the warm sunshine. Next was the North American Black Bear and the Canadian Timber Wolf. This was definitely the favourite enclosure in our car – we spent a considerable time watching the huge Black Bears climb effortlessly high up into the trees – absolutely mesmerising. Eventually we moved on and back into African territories where we saw a pride of African Lions. Again, we had fantastic views of them, but sadly they were just basking in the sunshine and not very active. The Giraffe and Zebra and other grassland animals were out in the parkland and a little more active. Finally, we braved the Barbary Macaques and the African forests – we laughed in great amusement as we watched the monkeys hitching rides atop cars, our children desperately wanting one on our car!!
The safari park guidebook is really informative and is laid out in the same order as the safari park – it was good to be able to follow this through and talk with our children about the animals and also with ways in which we can help some of the endangered species.
We spent over two hours enjoying our safari, before parking up and continuing our adventure by entering the foot safari and experiencing the rest of the park.
There was the opportunity to get up close with the elephants and keepers in Elephant Meadow – we highly recommend the daily talk. The Australian Walkabout with Wallaby, Rhea and of course Kangaroos was a favourite, as was Penguin World and the Desert Springs. There are Sea Lions, Farmyard animals, Aviaries, Lemurs and so many more animals.
There are plenty of places to eat around the park, you can choose from a great range of locally sourced food in the Safari restaurant, Swan cafe or the 2×2 restaurant in the play Ark. There were snacks, sandwiches, cakes and thankfully ice creams too (a tip – the queues for ice-creams were incredibly long – we found the restaurants had ice cream freezers and much smaller queues).
There are daily talks and demonstrations, there are the most amazing indoor and outdoor play areas, VIP experiences where you can get even closer to some of the animals and The Safari Lodge which yesterday was the venue for a wedding.
What sets this aside from any other safari park we have visited is that you can re-enter the drive through safari as many times as you like. The last entry is at 5pm, and so just as we were about to leave last evening we decided to have another drive through. It was so good to see the animals again, and this time we had such a different experience as it was just starting to rain a little, and the animal behaviours were so different. The Tigers were up and walking around, the Lions were also much more active, and the Black Bears were so amusing to watch as they bounded across the grass and climbed up and down the trees chasing each other.
We had the most amazing, fun family day. My eldest son has just had spinal surgery, and this was his first trip out since surgery. We were a little nervous but found that there were plenty of places for him to stop and rest, the toilet facilities were clean, and that the food was good. All the staff we met were very friendly and full of informative facts. We had a top day out, and would thoroughly recommend. We didn’t get to see everything as there was so much to experience – we’ll definitely be making another visit later in the year.
Tickets can be purchased online at a slightly reduced rate starting at £16.99 for a child (age 3-15 years) and £23.99 for an adult. Annual Pass tickets giving 12 months of admission start at £69.99 for a child and £89.99 for an adult. In addition, family tickets, all-inclusive tickets and a passport ticket offering entry to both Woburn Abbey and Woburn Safari Park are available.
A fun filled, educational, family day out.
Rating: 5/5
Tickets cost from £16.99
For more information or to book tickets visit www.woburnsafari.co.uk.
Woburn Safari Park, Milton Keynes, Bedfordshire, MK17 9QN
