All Things Wild

A few weeks ago a friend of mine posted a few pictures on Facebook of a day out they had had at All Things Wild in Honeybourne, including some of huge model dinosaurs. In addition to the dinosaurs, there were animals and play areas so it seemed like the perfect place to visit with the girls. Despite it only being about 30 miles away, I had never heard of this place before and expected it to be fairly small and assumed that it would provide a couple of hours entertainment for the girls. How wrong I was.

Pulling up in the car park, it did look fairly small. The girls were excited to see a dinosaur above the entrance so I knew that at least they would enjoy seeing some dinosaurs even if it were a fairly short stay. Outside we wondered around looking at the animals they have including farmyard animals such as goats and more exotic ones such as raccoons and a Corsac fox.

There were also meerkats which are some of Freyja’s favourite animals. The girls were facinated watching them playing and were able to get so close to them. Freyja was particularly amused by the box of balls that were in the enclosure for the meerkats to play with.

The girls spotted a tractor to sit on and a play area and they had lots of fun before demolishing some of the picnic.

We then set off to find the dinosaurs. As we did so, it began to dawn on me just how big this place was as we passed an area for den building, pond dipping, a go kart racing track and a log walkway.

As we went into the dinosaur trail, I couldn’t help but hum the theme tune to “Jurassic Park”. This was totally lost on the girls but amused me. Thankfully visiting during the week, it was quiet enough for nobody else to notice the lunatic woman humming and giggling to herself.

The trail had a range of different dinosaurs. Freyja was able to recognise Stegosaurus, Triceratops, Pteranodon and Tyrannosaurus, but was keen for me to tell her about the names of the other dinosaurs.

Emily is surprisingly calm considering the huge Pteranodon behind her

Freyja and I encounter a Deinonychus – which were the real Velociraptors in Jurassic Park – do you get the impression that I was enjoying the dinosaurs slightly more than the girls were?

After the dinosaur trail there was another play area with a jeep and a helicopter to explore as well as swings and a huge sandpit.

The girls then finished off the picnic before spotted a mound of earth with tunnels running through it. They both had so much fun crawling through after each other (getting covered in dirt) through different tunnels and popping up in the centre.

As we headed back towards the main centre, I spotted that animal encounters were taking part in one of the barns. Freyja is always a bit nervous getting close to animals. I think this comes from having a nervous cat as a pet – she has learnt that he needs space. I was amazed that she quite willingly had a very tame, and very sweet guinea pig sat on her lap which she stroked for a few minutes. She was so proud of herself and kept telling me “I was very brave wasn’t I Mummy?” which of course she was!

We then went in search of the toilets and once we were inside we found a few more surprises including a great soft play area. This was situated next to an area with seats and tables – perfect for grabbing a cuppa from the café whilst the children played.

The girls were getting quite tired by this point, so I persuaded them out of the soft play to go and find some more animals, and we headed off towards the reptiles. After seeing snakes, lizards and a crocodile, we turned the corner to find a tractor racing track and another soft play area. The girls were off….

They could have stayed in here for even longer, but I was concerned that it was now past Emily’s naptime and she could do with a sleep. However, as we were walking through the shop before leaving, Freyja spotted another doorway, and through here we found an indoor beach. This was the biggest sandpit the girls had ever seen and it was deserted as all the other kids were enjoying the sunny weather and the outdoor sandpit! I said the girls could have just five minutes before we had to go.

Half an hour later two overly-tired girls were persuaded to come out of the indoor beach. They had such a fantastic day, but they were so tired that they left the centre screaming and in floods of tears. This didn’t last long as Emily was asleep before I started the car engine and Freyja had gone by the time I left the car park.

I was totally unprepared for how much there was to do at All Things Wild. It was really good value and I will definitely be taking the girls back again some time soon.