![]() ![]() Getting there: 229 Safari Ln, Natural Bridge, VA The park offers car vacuum cleaners in the parking lot on the way out of the park, so you can clean up after your park experience. The llamas can be quite wily in their efforts to gain access to the feed - they have incredibly long necks and don’t hesitate to lean their heads all the way into your vehicle looking for some feed. Know before you go: Your vehicle will get messy and the animals specialize in knocking the buckets of food out of your hands. This time we escaped without even scratches from the Watusi horns. Now, while that seems to be a fairly standard caveat, our car was damaged on the last visit. The park is not responsible for injuries to any individual or damage to any vehicle. Word of warning: All persons entering the safari park do so at their own risk. The parks also provide annual grants to deserving programs located in the region, in the United States and abroad. There’s a lot of laughing at the antics the animals put you through to get the food - so make sure you purchase at least two buckets the park recommends one bucket per person.īut like its sister parks, Gulf Breeze Zoo in Florida and Alabama Safari Park, the Virginia Safari Park has a more serious mission: these three zoological parks support wildlife conservation through ongoing support of organizations doing work in the wild. The animals are lovely though, and the slow drive through the safari is fun, whether you’re a 10 year old kid or a middle-aged woman. Hang on tight, because the animals have learned to grab the buckets and there’s often a brief tug of war (and as you drive around the park, there are numerous buckets along the road, which I suspect the park personnel pick up each evening). The fallow deer, a deer species native to Europe, work collectively with the sika deer, a species native to Japan, to make good on the llamas’ effort, and in the wake of the llamas, crowd around the windows looking for the feeding buckets. Then, as you roll to a stop, they’ll turn their heads, make eye contact with you, and grin. They greet you as you roll into the park with an orchestrated effort to slow your vehicle down to a stop by loping confidently in front of your car. There’s also elk llamas Watusi cattle pot bellied pigs emus, rhea and ostriches and more. Virginia Safari Park is home to more than 80 animal species, including rhinos, giraffes and king cheetahs and a variety of deer from all over the world. This visit was just as exciting - although not as damaging to my vehicle. But as we entered, I mentioned that the last time, a water buffalo had gored my car, and they said, “Oh, you’re THAT travel writer.” (I was afraid for a moment that they wouldn’t let me back in.) It seemed like it was an unusual enough event that two years later, they still remembered. I didn’t believe them when they said we were the first to have an animal get its head stuck in a car - the water buffalo was just too blasé about the experience, ambling away as if she did this every week. On our first visit to the Virginia Safari Park, a water buffalo gored the roof of my Prius and got its head stuck in my car. The penguin exhibit is awesome and the cheetah and wolf exhibits were amazing.Īll-in-all, this was probably the best zoo in Virginia, if not the entire East Coast.The Virginia Safari Park is a fun zoo, minutes away from Interstate 81 in the Shenandoah Valley, where you can see and feed animals up-close from your vehicle as you drive through the scenic rolling hills. The aviary was cool and all the birds are pretty chill. You can feed the camels though.Īdditionally, you can get up close and personal with some kangaroos, if you get lucky. They have rhinos, giraffes, and camels running around, but you can't pet them. Also, feeding the ostriches and emu was a blast. The early animals will try to take it.) Feeding the animals directly from your vehicle is fun and amazing, but the wagon ride was much more relaxing. (When you go, try to hold onto your bucket. The drive through safari feeding couldn't be beat. I took my wife, daughter, and son here and everybody had a ton of fun. ![]() Simply put this is an experience you can't find anywhere else in Virginia. There aren't too many places you can go that you can guarantee the entire family will enjoy themselves, but this is one of them.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |