After a good night's sleep we were ready for breakfast at 8AM. It was a beautiful day outside.

As today is the Summer Solstice in this hemisphere, there were large crowds expected at Stonehenge, which is not too far away. Fortunately we were going against that traffic.

The track to Longleat Safari Park was pretty well signposted and we never had to do a U Turn to get there. We had prepaid for our tickets over the internet.

As you come into the park, you are confronted with the Manor House. It looks fantastic and the grounds have been mown beautifully. Ours never look like that at home.

The first item on the agenda was to go through the Safari Park. We had to present our tickets for that and then avoid the African village. It's an area where they feed the giraffes by hand and have lots of other smart things to extract the gold out of your pocket. Although there are a number of displays of animals that are free.

Then it was into the park itself. The first are was the giraffes that we had seen being fed, and zebras. Next was the monkeys and you had to have your windows shut, otherwise they would join you inside the car. As it was they were happy to leap on a car and then ride along for a while. Gnus were also lounging in the sun.

There were barriers between locations and two sets of gates to provide isolation. They only let about a dozen cars into an area at a time. There could be a lot of vehicles inside a cut off area, though.   You parked on the left and passed on the right. If there were any dangerous critters around, there was normally a member of the safari team, stationed in a wagon to keep an eye on them. Some of the vehicles look a little battered. They have probably had a discussion with a large animal.

We also saw flamingos and a couple of dozy pelicans sitting on the side of the road, well away from their enclosure.  There were a number of other African antelopes etc.

Next we went into the deer park, where a small herd of fallow deer live with Rhinos and camels. You could buy food for the deer and they had their noses inside cars looking for a handout.

There appears to be only one elephant in the park and she has her own enclosure. She's in retirement and was the last performing circus elephant in the UK. I guess circuses in the UK don't have elephants today.

Somewhere along the way, we spotted some vultures living in a large enclosure. They can fly but I saw them bang into the net, so that's not the best.

The Tigers were about, but not too easy to photograph and the same could be said for the lions. We went through the cheetah and wolf enclosures but could not see anything. Then it was back to the manor house and the cafes etc.

After a pit stop at one of the several toilets, I had a hot dog and that attacked me. We walked around and headed for the jungle river boat ride. I left Lynette to do that and took a couple of anti-allergy tablets and went to sleep in the car for a while. Lynette went on a 20 minute boat ride, seeing gorillas and hippos and then wandered around the manor house.

There were numerous displays and activities around the manor house. I saw African Porcupines fast asleep and I know there were meerkats there too.

When Lynette came back to the car, I was feeling a bit better, so we went through the safari park a second time. This time we did manage to see two cheetahs and a pack of timber wolves. Both lots of animals were a bit far for my camera, as Lynette had run her battery flat, and we still have not found a spare battery for her.

It wasn't to far to the B&B where were are to spend the night. The owner gave us directions to the Mill in Rode, a pub where we had a pleasant meal. We do notice the prices increasing as we head closer to London, though.

On the way back to the B&B we saw the white horse on the hill, so headed down to Westbury to find a place to take a photo. 

Longleat manor

Above and Below -  Feed the giraffes

Sleepy pelican by the side of the road

Is the driver going the right way?

I'm leaving this one.

A relaxed Gnu

Beautiful horns.  Ian will be able to identify these critters.

Came and rhino

A fallow deer.  In NZ he would be on a plate.

Tiger

Above and Below - Lions well away from the camera.

Do your shrubs look like these of the manor house?

A silver back gorilla.  53 years old, I believe.

Just one of the rooms Lynette visited inside the big house.

The white horse on the hill.