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Blair Drummond Safari and Leisure Park

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MagdaDH
MagdaDH
First Reviewer
4 out of 5
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Editor Pick

Blair Drummond Safari and Adventure Park

  • November 17, 2009
  • Rated 3 of 5 by Joy S from Manchester, United Kingdom
Blair Drummond Safari and Adventure Park

The park is located near Stirling at Junction 10, just off the M9. We decided to stop off here, to break up our journey to the Highlands. From our home in North West England, it was a 3 hour drive to Blair Drummond which made it almost exactly halfway.

Ticket prices are £11.00 for adults and £7.50 for children. It is open daily between 10:00am and 5:30pm. The park closes for the winter though - the closing date this year is 02 November.

A visit combines a mixture of driving through animal reserves, then parking and walking through a pets farm, playing in adventure areas, taking in sealion and falconry displays and visiting Chimp Island. We stayed about 3 hours - this was enough time to see and do everything.

Blair Drummond is apparently Scotland's only African style safari park and is one of the major attractions of the area. There are a range of exotic and wild animals to see, including elephants, tigers, lions, chimps, rhinos, giraffes and penguins. It is one of the original three safari parks to open in the UK (the others being Longleat and Woburn). Animals were originally brought here from Africa.

The park opened in 1970 in the grounds of Blair Drummond House, bought by Sir John Kay, a Glasgow tea merchant in 1916. He passed it to his nephew, father of the present owner - Jamie Muir. It was a family home until 1977 when it was passed to a charity - the Camphill Trust.

Today the park extends to 120 acres. It has a large number of endangered species and is involved in breeding and research programmes for endangered species.

Highlights for us included:

- Lemur Land - this is a sanctuary you can walk through and watch the lemurs at close quarters. During our visit they were mostly up in the trees above us.

- Chimp Island - the novelty of this is the boat ride to the island which is the home of the chimpanzees. Apparently they cannot swim, which is why they don't escape. A guide told us about the animals and we were splashed by a cheeky chimp at the end.

- Sea Lion shows take place 4 times a day - educational as well as fun.

Viewing platforms are located throughout the park, so you can see into some of the enclosures from an elevated position. This is especially good to see the giraffes, rhinos and zebras.

As well as the animals there is an adventure playground, zipwire, peddle boats and some rides.

From journal 5 Days in the Scottish Highlands

Editor Pick

Face to Face with Giraffes, Eagle Owls & Sea Lions

  • September 10, 2009
  • Rated 4 of 5 by MagdaDH from Perth, United Kingdom
Face to Face with Giraffes, Eagle Owls & Sea Lions

Blairdrummond, the only "real" safari park in Scotland, is located off A9 near Stirling and is so far the best animal park/zoo/aquarium I have visited in Scotland (although we have not been to Edinburgh zoo).

It combines the safari park, where you drive through enclosures with animals and you are not separated from them by a fence; monkey island that can be observed from a boat; more traditional zoo enclosures; a birds of prey show; small fairground; very decent playpark and a bit of a circus show (with sea lions).

The park is located in a nice stretch of countryside and there is a feeling of space. The more popular parts do get crowded, but it's usually possible to find a quieter spot.

Blairdrummond has several catering facilities, but they also provide numerous picnic tables, there are also areas of grass where you could picnic on a rug and even barbecues provided where you could burn your own sausages and chops were you so inclined.

The entry is £11 for adults and £7.50 for children, which is not cheap by any means but considering what's on offer, and comparing it to attractions like for example the Deepsea World, is pretty good value as you can fairly easily make a whole day out of it and as you can bring your own food and drink, you don't need to spend much extra money. If you have children with you, you will likely be pestered for the fairground tokens, which are extra, and ice-cream. The astro-glide giant slide is included in the price (the queues were really long when we went), but the fairgound rides (dodgems, bouncy castle, roundabouts) are not.

The selection of animals is rather good: I loved the giraffes (I had never seen a giraffe in real life before!) and trying to spot the tigers in their enclosure was fun (but then I love tigers). We also really liked the bears, sadly one of them died recently.

The birds of prey show was brilliant, entertaining and informative; particularly the Eagle Owl and the Sea Eagle. the shows are at 12.45, 14.15 and 15.45 and definitely worth catching.

The sea lion show was worth seeing, but very busy, and as it takes at least 20 minutes, it was hard to keep the two year old in place throughout.

We have not been on the Monkey Island boat, as the little one was getting tired and cranky by that time - but it looked rather good and we'll make a point of doing that on our next visit.

All in all, a really good attraction, well worth the price and an hour's drive it is from where we live.

http://www.blairdrummond.com/

From journal Perthshire Attractions

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