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ThisIsnt: A trip to the zoo

What bank holiday weekend is complete without a trip to the local zoo. We decided to see what was going on at Paignton Zoo, they've been shouting about their new baby rhino enough.

The last time I went I was knee high to a grass hopper, so what's it like now? We thought we'd find out, and we took a small child with us for good measure. Turns out they're running an Easter Treasure hunt too. Bargain.

After getting up nice and early to beat the grockle hoard it only took about an hour to get to Paignton, looks like we beat the rush. There's a slightly odd queuing scenario going on at the entrance, but we were soon inside.

From the car-park and the entrance you get a nice view of the bright pink flock of Flamingoes wading through their pond. All very pretty.

Next came the price. Not so pretty. £10.30 for adults and £6.90 for kids over 3. Why you would bring a spawling infant is beyond me, but it's free. That's before the 'voluntary donation' of 10%. Add a map for £2.50 and you're looking at about 30 quid (You can always visit their website and print out a map, and there are plenty of them posted about the place). Not too steep for a day out, but certainly packs a punch.

The hunt begins. We got a form with a number of questions. The main feature of the Ley, what owls do when prodded with sticks, why gibbons make the bloody racket they do, the name of three gorillas, how long a zebra takes to drop a sprog and what zoos were running a dating agency for fruit bats. It's at this point we wish we'd brought a pen. Oh well, a camera will do for now.

Once we were inside it was time for a safari. We thought we'd start with the forest area where the lions and tigers live. To get there we had to go through the avian wetlands, apparently. A dirt great net with a shed load of birds twittering about. The main feature of the Ley is the Ley Lake, the largest natural lake in the UK (answer number one on your forms kiddy-winks).

The lions weren't up to much at 10am to be honest. The lioness was lying up on her perch, half sleeping and doing nothing in particular whilst a rather sad looking lion padded up and down the front of the enclosure keeping an eye on those strange people walking past.

He didn't look to happy to see us, but then at that time in the morning who would appreciate a couple hundred folk walking past staring at you and your Mrs? I know I wouldn't, especially if I'd just woken up. No-one needs that, it's just not the done thing.

After that it's on past the Cassowaries and owls (who stare down threats and puff up there feathers to look big, I hope you're taking notes...) and over to the tigers, who were also looking pretty displeased with the whole state of affairs, but seemed to be much more dignified about it.

You know that 'Yes, we're beautiful' look pretty much every cat has mastered? That's the one.

Next on the list was the avian breeding centre which is a whole lot less sexy than it sounds. Lots of brightly coloured beaks and plumage but not a shag or a tit in sight.

I guess it was still too early in the morning, and besides, there were kids present.

There's some climbing frames and slides for the lit'luns, which seemed to go down well, even if they do need a little encouragement to get right to the top, and the smell of hot-dogs proved too much to resist.

Before you get to the lemurs it's past the gibbons, who sing to each other to reeniforce the family unit, and mark territory (answer three, fill it in).

We saw this one in a cage set up for the lemurs, but we're not quite sure what it was. There were no rings on the tail and it seemed to be playing with a hosepipe. It seemed quite intelligent and if you looked in it's eyes it was almost like it understood. Bless him.

It was close to the oran utans, who are known as the men of the forest, and we can see the similarities.

The ape centre didn't seem to have much going on, other than a rather overpowering smell of something pretty nasty, presumably created by Penitrax, Kumbuka and Kiva and then it was over to the zoo's pride and joy.

Born about a month ago, the latest arrival was Zuri, the female calf born on the 5th of March.

Mum looked pretty pleased with her little bundle of grey wrinkles, but they weren't straying too far from the pen, which is only to be expected with such a young one. They seemed rather bemused by the constant stream of visitor turning up, pointing and moving on.

It's a steep slope from there up to the cheetahs, cluttered with pushchairs and pregnant women who didn't see the sign warning as much at the bottom of the path.

I really don't see the point in bringing kids that young, do they even understand what they're seeing at the time? Most of them looked more confused than the local inhabitants.

When we all got the the top the elephants were nowhere to be seen, until we got into their shed that is. It was at that point we found they were having a competition with the gorillas as to who can make the funkiest smell (The gorillas won that one hands down, but they gave it a good old go).

Our poor agony aunt had to cover her nose and run to the exit, and she's made of pretty stern stuff.

I should point out that up until now there had been a little voice saying 'can we see the giraffes?' every now and again, so when the big moment came we were glad to see they were up and about and plodding around the place in the way that only a giraffe can.

They'm tall buggers and no mistake.

By now we were all thinking about lunch, and all I can say is I'm glad we decided to pack ourselves a picnic to take with us. At 10 o'clock in the morning it might have been easy enough to get a hot dog, but by something past 12 the place was a tad busier and the queues were tending towards infinity. If only we could harness the power of this many grockles queuing.

After lunch with the zebras, who have a 11.5 month gestation period (nearly there) we had a mozy on down to the fruit bats who are being bred at Jersey, Paignton, Chester, Bristol and London - pick any two, I promise were' done. Thankfully there was a pen on the last post, so fill in those forms in your neatest handwriting. On to find the promised Easter Egg mine, with chocolate and prizes to be had.

With form grasped in little hands the mine isn't quite what we expected, but the promise of chocolate and an 'encounter with a giant tortoise' seemed to make up for it. Fluffy bunny or Easter chick? The choice is yours.

One thing I never expected to see was the rare four assed monkey. And fine asses they were, all bulging and red, ballooning magnificently in the sunlight. Kinda eye-catching but still essentially four asses. A very odd experience.

Have to run through the reptile house because the snakes are scary, but we are going to go and see them. You try and figure out the logic of a child, I just dare you. The dessert house was pretty cool, lots of guinea pigs burrowing amongst the rocks.

No trip is complete without the obligatory ride on the train, and at only 50p a ticket it's not exactly highway robbery. Our friendly driver Mo made sure all arms and legs were tucked away inside the cars before we were off for a quick lap of the lake. This is one of the few memories I have of Paignton as a child and I'm sure it went down well with the .5 we had borrowed.

All in all a pretty good day out. A touch pricey and would have been more-so if we hadn't brought lunch, but not really too bad. Plenty to see and a good walk. Will do you the world of good. A little tiring for tiny legs so you might get a nice peaceful ride home too.

Just remember to take a pen, get up early before the rush and take a packed lunch. And if the weather's anything like it was on Friday take some sun screen.

Or you could go down the pub.

Paignton Zoo