Not so fun.

I don't go to zoos and I don't go to the circus, I just don't enjoy them, and I don't think it's right. I do, however, enjoy a good wildlife preserve, and I thought that this would be one. The write-ups and brochures made it look phenomenal, you'd think I would have known better. However, I had a sick feeling walking through this place like I was helping someone profit off the exploitation of animals. Had I felt like staff were raising these animals due to rescue purposes and to educate us I think I could have stomached the very small cages some of these animals were in.

Lions, tigers, cougars...all in small wire cages, no grass, some had virtually no shade. They just paced and paced and paced, it broke my heart and I had tears running down my face, I tried hard not to cry, but it chokes me up even now, writing about it. I only spotted one staff person around the whole time we were there (except when they were letting kids pets a tiger cub). No one was monitoring the people walking around the animals and how the animals were being treated (or the safety of the people interacting with the animals for that matter!). The chimpanzee was furious, screaming and throwing things, baring his teeth, the bears sat on their haunches and waved their paws for food that visitors were tossing at them, God only knows what they eat during the course of a day. I think people should think twice about what the true purpose of this attraction is. If you have no problem not questioning this, then you will probably enjoy it. Myself, I regret supporting this sort of business.

There were some free roaming animals, mostly the kind that are domesticated anyhow..llamas, goats, some peacocks and some deer. I don't think it's hypocritical to say that I enjoyed them, they could wander at will, they also had large pens they could go into if they chose, and basically, they are farm animals, and were living a "farm animal life". We left very quickly, I can only hope that my $30.00 admission fee went to a good cause.

If you double click on the picture below, you can see one of the cages in the background. The green grassy cages had, oddly enough, skunks, little wild pigs and some tiny deer.