Christmas at Colchester Zoo

ad – I was offered press tickets for colchester zoo but all thoughts are my own

I love a festive day out and I also love the zoo. So you can imagine my delight when Carl and I were offered press tickets for a day out at Colchester Zoo to experience their Christmas festivities and of course spend the day with all their beautiful animals. Colchester Zoo is somewhere I’ve been visiting since I was a kid, so I’m really grateful for these tickets to visit this Christmas!

Colchester Zoo is a fantastic place to visit any time but it makes an absolutely wonderful day out for the whole family around Christmas. They have introduced a ton of festive things throughout the entire park over the season, most of which are aimed at children, so if you have children and need a fun day out this Christmas, Colchester Zoo should definitely be on your list!

Make your way through the Yuletide Maze, visit The Enchanted Woodland (and the ADORABLE fairy houses), the elves workshop, Santa’s Reindeer Stable and much more. Throughout the rest of the park, you’ll find festive treats in their coffee shops and restaurants as well as fairy-lights and light up structures illuminating the entire park.

During these festive days throughout December, the park also stays open until 7:30pm, so you can really see and experience the magic of the lights as you wander around the zoo in the dark. It was a really special day and evening out and was really nice to see and feel the atmosphere of the zoo change as it got dark.

So we got involved in as much of the festive things as we could. Being a couple without children it was definitely noticeable how much the Christmas activities were aimed at kids; which is great, if you have them! The decorations around the zoo I very much appreciated and we also treated ourselves to their festive drinks from the coffee shop.

I had the Gingerbread Hot Chocolate which was absolutely delicious and there was no mistaking the gingerbread flavour at all! A bonus was the cute little gingerbread biscuit on top. Carl got their Santa’s Cookies Hot Chocolate which he absolutely devoured as well.

Our actual trip around the zoo to see the animals was wonderful. We were SO lucky with our timings during this trip so we got to see some really cool things and some of the animals really up close, which was great. This is the first time I’ve properly seen their new Chimpanzee enclosure, which is absolutely HUGE and we were treated to two of the chimps running around and playing.

Edge of Africa is one of my favourite areas of the zoo as it’s so open with some beautiful animals roaming around. We got a good view of their beautiful elephants, the zebras and rhinos as well as watching the keepers with the giraffes in the inside part of their enclosure. This is also where you’ll find a beautiful python and pigmy hippos – aww!

Another of my favourites are the fennec foxes, which are so adorable and definitely look like they belong in Star Wars. We also went through the goat walkthrough (which Carl HATED because he hates goats, I on the other hand absolutely love them), enjoyed watching the Koi Carp and we also caught the lions have a little afternoon snooze.

I just love Colchester Zoo. I love listening to the talks about the animals, reading all the facts and supporting the zoo however I can. And with this addition of their Christmas festivities, I can imagine the zoo is going to be busier and more bustling than ever! There really is something for everyone and it doesn’t matter how old you are, everyone can appreciate a day out at the zoo.

Their entrance and gift shop facilities have come SO FAR as well, from a few years ago. It’s a beautiful space (with “space” being the operative word here for social distancing) and the gift shop is to DIE for. They sell a ton of stuff for adults and children including gorgeous home-ware, bath-bombs and jewellery. I treated myself to a necklace whilst I was there.

We both thoroughly enjoyed the day out and will no doubt be going back in the New Year. Have you been to Colchester Zoo?

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