Making friends with meercats…

A rainy Sunday is hell on earth if you have little children who are at the stage of wanting to move around. After several wet weekends we decided to get out and about, and, with Munchkin’s growing fascination with the animal world, Cotswold Wildlife Park seemed to be the place to go. Plus, R got excited about lions and leopards and giraffes. Big kid…

Luckily for R Munchkin, it didn’t disappoint. £15 to get in isn’t cheap, but for us it was totally worth it – there was lots to see and plenty to do and it wasn’t too busy or crowded either.

Munchkin pottered about, practising her walking and squealing and pointing at everything from donkeys to rhinos.

She loved the children’s farm and the goats and Shetland ponies, was fascinated by meercats and penguins, enjoyed watching the scenery pootle past on the train and generally seemed excited by all the space she had to just roam about.

The joy of somewhere like this is that you can go again and again, as Munchkin gets older I know she’ll see more and engage more and be able to do some of the great kids activities they have there too. The shop – for once – wasn’t crazily over-priced and they sell the brilliant Schliech painted animals, such high quality and a better price than I’ve seen them elsewhere. We bought a zebra, a lion and a penguin, and a cuddly meercat we’ve called Melvin. Or Malcolm. Something like that anyway…

Plus, for adults, it’s not too shabby either. Go in the morning, finish by 1:30pm and head – like we did – to a nice, cosy gastro pub to get out of the rain and warm up by the fire. The Five Alls in Filkins is less than 5 minutes away, The Swan at Southrop is 15 minutes and the fabulous The Village Pub in Barnsley is 20 minutes. Book a table – it’s a Sunday after all – and, relax. Munchkin gobbled up her lunch while playing with her new toys and squealing at the animals heads on the walls. Perfect.