When you travel full-time as a family, you quickly learn that ‘bigger’ isn’t always ‘better.’ While we’re always scouting for the next great local zoo or theme park for our daughters, a recommendation from a friend led us to a hidden gem in East Sussex: Drusillas Park. Nestled near Alfriston, this 10-acre zoo might be small in size, but it’s packed with more personality and interactive fun than parks twice its scale.
Getting Started: Tips for Entry
The park is easy to find and well sign posted, there are clear instructions on the website, with full details on how to get there. There is ample parking once you arrive a very clearly laid out queuing system depending whether your tickets were purchased online, or if your paying at the entrance. I would definitely recommend paying and reserving you tickets online in order to take advantage of a discounts, also bare in mind the park frequently runs special offers, so keep an eye out for those.
Interactive Learning: Keeping Kids Engaged
Once we enterer the park it was clear to see the theme was totally geared towards kids with the aim of making the experience fun and educational.
The first interactive exhibit was for the kids to pick up their animal spotter book that contained pictures of twenty animals that lived at the zoo, once the children saw the animals there was stamp at each exhibit to stamp the booklet. This was such an engaging activity that our eldest daughter loved and it was great way to encourage the kids to see all of the animals in the park.
The educational aspect was apparent at every exhibit, each one was fun and practical for the children. This really helped with their understanding and how certain animals provided us with food. For example in the farm section, they had a model cow which the kids could milk, and diagram showing how the cows digestive system worked. In the world we will live in, I think it is so important to teach our children the link between animals and food. Also it was great to know that the farm animals in the evening also went back in the fields and the working farm they lived on.
Rides and Themed Adventures
Drusilla’s although not very big in size, is well designed and thought through, making it easy to navigate. The second section of the park has some themed rides, this allowed the kids to have some fun on the Hello kitty’s Secret Garden and the flying hippo before we explored the rest of the zoo.
Play and Picnic: The Adventure Playground
Once we had finished with the rides, it was time for lunch we had brought our own picnic and were pleased to find a big seating area with picnic tables and even a small garden to lay down your picnic blanket. Even if you hadn’t brought the picnic there was various eating options from Jacket potatoes, ribs and burgers and there was plenty of places for tired parents to have a well earned coffee, even a Starbucks!
After a quick lunch were were ready to explore the park some more. We decided to take the Safari Express, departing from Mungo’s Central Station around the park this allowed us to see what the rest of the park had to offer, and view some of the larger animals from a distance like the dromedary and lamas.
Afterwards the girls couldn’t resist a play in the huge adventure play ground with climbing frames and slides and swings all in keeping with the African safari Theme. There are three sections to the play area, one section for younger children five and under another for older children 8 years and over and then a splash/ wet section with fountains, so on hot summers day the kids can play and cool down in this part of the park.
After a quick play and ice cream, we headed out to visit the rest of the animal exhibits which included the ring tailed Lemurs from Madagascar which had a walk through enclosure, so we were able to get very close. There was also a walk through enclosure for the rainbow lorikeet birds which you could feed.
Allowing the children to get so close to the animals is wonderful as it encourages their appreciation for the animals and sparks their interest. One of my favourites animals was the red panda and the beautiful spotted flamingos.
Thinking Nomads Verdict – Is it Worth the Price?
Overall we had super fun day out at Drusilla’s, I was happy to see that all the animals were well looked after and all the enclosures were clean and well kept. The educational aspect of the park was brilliant at every exhibit they had created fun practical activities for the children to take part in like the Animal spotter booklet and the Zoo Olympics challenges. I also recommend to read my post Family Day out at Marwell Zoo in Hampshire – England if you are looking to explore more venues for kids in England.
Advice and Tips
- Cost of Entrance: approx £36 per person. Buy online and save time and money.
- How to get there: for direction click here
- Don’t forget – swimming costume for the splash area, hats and water
- Take a picnic to keep costs down
Make sure the kids take part in the Zoo Olympics and Animal Spotting, collect the booklets at the entrance.
Ready for another family adventure? If you enjoyed this guide to one of the South East’s favorite attractions, you won’t want to miss our full Folly Farm Adventure Park and Zoo Review. Discover why this Welsh gem is another “must-visit” for families who love animals, vintage fairgrounds, and hands-on learning!
Eternal adventurer and wanderlust seeker! Always thinking about (and planning) our next adventure, hence the name”Thinking Nomads”!
Wife to Marco and mamma to Isabella and Maya. India, Nepal and Vietnam are my top three countries!
Norway, Iceland and South Africa are top of my bucket list!
