"We're going to the zoo..zoo..zoo.."

"We're going to the zoo..zoo..zoo. How about you..you..you? We're going to the zoo..zoo..zoo. You can come too..too..too"

Anyone else remember that song from their childhood? No...just me then? 

Today we went to the zoo and I brought the camera with me so by reading this, you can come and enjoy our trip to the zoo too! 

We are lucky enough to live less than an hour away from the fantastic Colchester zoo so we tend to go there on quite a regular basis. Located just south of Colchester, this Zoo, for me, ticks all of the boxes. Not only does it have wonderfully modern and spacious homes for over 270 species of animals, it also has numerous play areas, a soft play section, walk through exhibits and lot's of talks and animal shows to watch. It really is a full day of fun for all the family and if I am being honest, I think you would struggle to do everything all in one day.


Arriving at the zoo on Sunday morning, I instantly felt like I was about 10 again! I started mentally thinking about all of the things we wanted to see and set off on our journey round the zoo. Bubba wasn't in the best of mood (turned out he was actually a little under the weather) but, as always, he loved seeing the animals and he especially liked the chimps in their new home. One was sitting right by the window and he stood looking at it for a couple of minutes pointing and saying ''oooooo''.

The zoo has a huge bridge type walk way that goes across some of the enclosures and bubba really enjoying walking across and being able to look down and see all the monkeys running around below him. His other favourite part was the underwater tunnel beneath the sea lion pool. We spent over 20 minutes in that tunnel and at first I thought it was because he was enjoying watching the sea lions swim above him. I quickly realised that it was actually the pattern on the floor from the reflection of the sun through the water that was entertaining him so much :)

As I mentioned before, Colchester Zoo is not only filled with animals, it has some fantastic play areas too. They seem really thought out as there are play areas for older children and littler ones and I really appreciated that. Bubba spent almost half an hour running around one of the play areas aimed at the smaller guests and I think the reason that he loved it so much was because all of the climbing equipment and slides were accessible to him and not too big. We have previously been on days where the weather hasn't been great so we have retreated to the soft play center which is a genius idea! For me, it meant that even though the weather wasn't great and we couldn't walk around and see many animals, the ticket price wasn't wasted as Bubba still was able to enjoy himself. 

The highlight of this Zoo for me is the Kingdom of the Wild section. This section features a massive outdoor space which houses Zebras, Giraffes, Rhinos, Ostrich and Elephants. If that isn't enough, there is then a huge indoor sections which has the sleeping quarters in for these animals but also includes Patas Monkeys, a few snacks and reptiles, leaf cutter ants and (my favourite) pygmy Hippos. 

Overall, I can't recommend Colchester Zoo enough. We love them as they are less than an hour away from us, have so many different things for all the family to enjoy and most importantly, they have (obviously) happy animals who enjoy large, spacious enclosures and numerous of enrichment activities. You can see all the details about Colchester Zoo here and if you are ever down South then I would recommend a day out to the Zoo :)