Friday 30th September – Liverpool/Safari Park

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This morning I made the most of the Internet and Skyped my family – we had big catch-ups about what has been happening! After discussions about what to do for the day we decided to go our own way again so Nicole went to the Beatles Museum, Steve went to a bike shop which I didn't want to go to so instead went to some girly shops then we all met back a few hours later... Nicole with a few souviners, Steve went back and bought some bike shoes and me... nothing! Still cannot find any shoes that I really really like darn it!
We grabbed some lunch from the supermarket because that was easiest then headed out of Liverpool to Knowsley Safari Park. We each had to pay to get in but then we got to drive our cars around the park and we were the ones in the 'cage' (our car) and the animals were roaming free. I think the only 'usual' animal I saw that we have in New Zealand was the emu but there were so many different animals it was awesome. We were allowed to have our car windows open for most of the drive so we could get quite close to the animals... there were some buffalos slightly to close for comfort so I shut the windows... their horns are MASSIVE... they are MASSIVE!!!
We drove into the lion area and saw some lions about 10 meters away from us so we took our photos then carried on where we found 3 lions sitting right by the road... it was amazing. It was the closest I have ever been to a lion and they were right there... less than a meter away from me!!! They were sleeping though!
Further round the safari park we came across the baboon enclosure where there were 2 options... the car friendly option to drive around the outside or the option to drive through the enclosure and risk having the baboons damage the car – I bet you can't guess which option we choose... in the rental car... Yip we decided to drive in! We saw a car driving past that had baboons sitting all over it, but they looked like they were just sitting on there so we thought 'Why not?'... I'll tell you why not... because they are cheeky little shits (excuse my language but they really are!!!!!). We were about 10 meters in when the first big baboon was sitting in the middle of the road almost waiting for his next victim (yes it was definitely a HIM) – he jumped onto our bonnet right infront of Steve (who was driving) and decided it would be a great idea to sprawl himself over the window! Well that was fine at first. The second one was a smaller male (and yes, again I am VERY sure that this was a male baboon) who jumped onto our rear window wiper. He started picking and pulling then next thing we saw a wire hanging down. Well he spent the rest of the ride tugging at that. About half way around the drive the baboon on our front window started licking our bonnet... that was ok, free car wash... and cleaning out the dried leaves from by the window wipers and eating them... that too was ok. He then thought it would be a good idea to pull the seal off the front of the window on the driver's side. That is when Steve put his foot down because we saw another baboon eyeing up our car. The big ass baboon sitting in Steve's way meant Steve almost ran another massive baboon over that was slowly walking across the road... whoops! We got round to the exit where the baboons were still sitting on our car causing havoc and one of the zoo keepers came out with a large stick... with the sight of that the baboons jumped off and were gone and we were left stuck in the car unable to jump out and assess the damage. We continued on our trip around the park discussing our stupid decision to bring the rental car into the enclosure. We stopped to look at another animal when the car that was behind us in the baboon enclosure came up next to us and informed us that the baboon had broken our rear window wiper and rear aerial... in which we paniced a tad! We made it to the end of the safari drive around part then promptly pulled over to assess the damage and it was nowhere near as bad as we thought! The baboon had kindly left the rubber seal that he had pulled off the back on our bumper so we were able to reattach that and push the bung in again (we mistook the bung for the rear aerial... turns out we don't have a rear aerial!) and the rear window wiper wasn't broken although we could understand why the guy thought that because of the shape of it. We were also able to reattach the front seal and at the end of the day the only real damage was a small gark out of the front seal where the baboon had yanked it off the car... little shits!!!!!
After this we walked around the area where there were some more animals but ones kept in enclosures. The elephants were funny, I reckon they are real thinkers. There was one who was being cheeky because every time I lifted my camera to take a photo of it he/she would move behind a pole so we were not making eye contact. I am pretty sure there was another one singing to itself because he/she was standing there swaying its head in perfect timing then started walking in time with the beat of his/her head was swaying... it was quite cute. I reckon the elephants were quite shy wee animals... hardly 'wee' though are they!!!
After we left the Safari Park we headed for Beckington (near Bath) and stopped along the way for a petrol stop and dinner stop. We arrived at our hotel at about 9pm so we are now ready for our visit to the Roman Baths and Stonehenge tomorrow!
Right up to date with blogs now so time for bed!
Lots of love,
Me
XX

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Photos

Photo 2
A emu that came right next to my OPEN window

Photo 3
A big as Bison

Photo 4
Lions that were right by the car.

Photo 5
I couldn't get the whole lion in the photo because it was literally centimetres away from our car.

Photo 6
A funny looking animal that I can't remember the name of!

Photo 7
A gammy ostrich

Photo 8
The cheeky sodding baboon sat right in front of Steve's view

Photo 9
Making himself at home before he started to ruin our car

Photo 10
Another rather large animal that I can't remember what it is called

Photo 11
The peacock that I was scared of (I blame Pake and Beppe for that... those evil eyed peacock feathers at their house have haunted me forever!)