Drusillas Park - What's New?

Drusillas Park
Alfriston Road
Alfriston
East Sussex
BN26 5QS
t: 01323 874100
f: 01323 874101
e: info@drusillas.co.uk

Go Wild!
Playland - We apologise that parts of Playland are closed whilst we transform the area into Go Wild! (an awesome new play area). During this period we are charging our lowest Off Peak rates as well as offering Come Again Soon half price children’s entry tickets (conditions apply) to day visitors. Go Bananas!, Amazon Adventure, Monkey Kingdom and Toddler Village will remain open as normal during this time.

Until Go Wild! opens in February 2009 a number of attractions are included in the entry price, including *Jungle Adventure Golf, *Dino-Dig, *Jungle Jumper and *Vertical Limit.

* Jungle Adventure Golf and Dino Dig are open all day. Jungle Jumper is open from 11am – 1pm and 2pm – 4pm daily. Vertical Limit is open weekends and East Sussex school holidays only. Jungle Jumper and Vertical Limit are weather dependant.

The 2008 Drusillas Photographic Competition reached a thrilling conclusion as judges awarded Zoo Keeper, Phil Turner the much coveted title of Staff Photographer of the Year. Phil received the first place prize of £200 for his photo of a lemur howling into the sky (below). Zoo Section Leader, Danielle Smith scooped the runners up prize of £100 for her image of two flamingos entwined in a love heart shape.

Staff Photographer of the Year

Due to the exceptionally high standard of entries, further prizes of Highly Commended were awarded to Zoo Keepers Liam Shepheard and Mark Kenward, as well as Volunteer worker Heidi Christmas. Each received a large tin of chocolates during a small presentation ceremony.

Albert and Mali, the two fennec foxes, will soon have completed the required period in quarantine.

They will take their place along the zoo route in time for Christmas, when there is no doubt this paw-fect pair are likely to be a huge hit.

The two mischievous meerkat twins born on 16th September have started exploring the world above and below ground, as they spend more and more time out of the burrows.

Meerkats are members of the mongoose family, living in complex underground tunnels in highly organised groups. The tiny burrowers have been making good progress and can now be seen taking life easy in the meerkats' cradle.

Don't forget that just because the summer is over it doesn't mean the fun has to stop because of the weather! Amazon Adventure, Drusillas' state-of-the-art indoor play area, offers a safari of tunnels, slides, climbing and soft play over three levels and is brilliant fun for all little monkeys come rain or shine.

Head of Education at Drusillas Park, James Woodward has returned from Kenya following a trip to the Maasai region of Amboseli. The purpose of the visit was to look at the work undertaken by the East African Wildlife Society, to whom Drusillas provide funding.

The money raised at the zoo through the Drusillas in Africa Project is used to support a community based initiative, employing a local Maasai conservationist to teach children in the area. James spent 10 days in Kenya, visiting schools and assessing how the scheme can be best helped in the future.

The family of two of the smallest otters in the world recently doubled in size, with the arrival of Asian short clawed otter twins on 29th August.

Protective parents Tara and Jambi had been caring for the new additions from within the safety of the nest. However, they have now been spotted outside the den. This represents an important first step in the youngsters' development and indicates that it will not be too long before the tiny tots will be playing and exploring their surroundings.

We've always known that Drusillas offers a great day out for all the family but now it's official. On 1st June 2008, Drusillas Park appeared at number 12 in the Sunday Times Top 50 days out in Britain.

Here is what they said about us:

An all action reimagining of the traditional zoo experience, Drusillas Park encourages kids both to meet the animals (mongooses and meerkats, parrots and porcupines) and also to ape them. They get to scale the monkey bars on the Zoolympics adventure trail, make like penguins in the swimming lagoon, wriggle through the anaconda run in the soft-play jungle and loads more. New this summer is the walk-through Lemurland enclosure, bringing you nose–to-nose with natures doe-eyed, daffy-tailed, arboreal acrobats.

Drusillas Park has also been voted the best visitor attraction in Sussex by listeners of Sovereign Radio.

Radio presenter Mike Buxton visited the Park in July to broadcast the East Sussex Today programme, interviewing a number of Drusillas staff. Listeners were then asked to vote for their favourite attraction in Sussex amongst a host of days out.

See www.drusillasinpictures.com for more information and pictures of Drusillas Park