Student Life October 2019

COLCHESTER
ZOO
BY LEANNE ARNOLD
Being an avid animal lover, I’ve always
loved going to the zoo! When I was a child
my mum would always take me to Banham
Zoo, being closer to where we lived. It
wasn’t until my adult years that I got to
experience Colchester Zoo, which is much
bigger and has a much wider range of
animals to see!
I think the zoo is super interactive, holding
lots of feeding talks and hosting the well
sized petting area where you can see
the cute goats and sheep. I have mixed
feelings about the goat petting area as
when I was younger I was caught by my
mum feeding the goats what I thought was
their food… it actually turned out to be
their poop (oops) and on top of this, I was
once chased and rammed by some angry
goats… so the idea of going into the areas
does frighten me somewhat! But I did
manage it, after much encouragement by
my girlfriend!
I got to feed the giraffes which was fun.
At first, I was worried I wouldn’t get the
chance as there were so many people who
also wanted to do it. But they were really
good with accommodating the big queues
and managed it well.
A highlight from Colchester Zoo for me
has to be the elephants. I absolutely adore
elephants; I think they’re the cutest big
animal in the world. So, I was very excited
to walk around that corner and see them
in their huge exhibit! I felt really lucky
as someone was doing the zoo keeper
for a day thing and was interacting with
one of them, so I walked around to get a
closer look. The elephants have such great
characters and it was so good to get to
see that!
On top of feeding the giraffes I also got to
feed the elephants, which I thought I was
going to embrace beautifully. Turns out
they are a hell of a lot bigger up close than
I initially cared for. So, when they sucked
up the fruit from
my hand I did jump
and make a bit of a
fool of myself.
Overall, I think
that Colchester
Zoo is a fantastic
day out for all
ages!! I’d definitely
recommend it!
41 • TRAVEL • STUDENT LIFE