Saturday 19th September

Louise and Matt invited Liz to join them on trip to Woburn Safari Park on Friday, she agreed, then Louise,after some thought, invited me to join them on Saturday instead. This invitation was made with an ulterior motive, we would use my car, obviously Louise had visions of monkeys swinging from their car's wing mirrors, dad's car was a better option, no family feeling there then, hah, hah! We used our car and Louise brought their satnav, as there were road works and the A1 was closed. We had to use the back roads through to St Neots, then back on to the A1. Liz kept noticing apples on trees alongside the road near St Neots, nobody else saw them, once Liz put her glasses on she no longer saw them either, shame, because she said the were quite large. We did use it a couple of times, although it was confused when we appeared to drive on non existent roads "at the roundabout take the thecond exit", the wretched machine had a lisp! We had to turn it off as the lisp was a bit off putting. Having made it to Woburn Safari park, without too much help from the lisping satnav we started to enjoy the game, there were a few gemsbok and eland in the first area, with a couple of Rhinos lying down some distance from the road, we got to see them a bit closer later. There was some sort of longhorn bull that everyone was queuing up in their cars to see,I think it was there to act as a calming influence for the Rhinos. We went through the black bear area and tiger enclosure to the vast lion enclosure. The lions were mostly just lying around, as big cats do although there was one, on a platform that took a bit of interest in the cars and you could see her mentally licking her lips, we got a few pictures and left the area for more tranquil surroundings. There was a large picnic area and various arenas in the centre of the park, we went of to see the lemurs feeding as this was what Louise was desperate to see, the went and watched the squirrel monkeys, they were desperate to get to the visitors, but the keepers had water in squirt containers to chase them away with, they are naturally very active and curious and thought this was a great game. We took a drive through the monkey enclosure on the way out, but they did not leap on our car, it was, no doubt, too old not modern enough for today's more discerning primate, they wouldn't want to be seen dead on it! The trip back to Forty Foot was quite quick and uneventful.