Monkey Forest is Fantastic (Monkey Forest (Trentham))

Member Name: blondgem

Product:	Monkey Forest (Trentham)
Date:	02/01/08 (321 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: See monkeys walk freely

Disadvantages: -

I've been to Trentham Monkey Forest on three occasions and now and I am so looking forward to going again when the weather warms up a little this year. Its a little to cold to wander round at the moment.

Initially when I went to the Monkey Forest for the second time, I did actually wonder why I was bothering as I had been before and at the end of the day what's going to be different the second time from the first but it is actually a different experience every time.

Trentham Monkey Forest is a 60 acre forest, home to over 140 free roaming Barbary macaques.

The Barbary macaque, normally would be found in the mountains of ALgeria and Morocco, possibly Gibraltar and is a tail-less Macaque. The animal is classed as a monkey as opposed to an ape, there is normally confusion over this due to it being tail-less. At the moment there are only currently around 1200 - 2000 Barbary Macaques left, some now which are housed to roam freely at Trentham Monkey Forest as they would if they were in the wild.

The Monkey Forest itself take around half an hour to walk around if you started and didn't stop, however they monkeys are fed every couple of hours and normally you always get the opportunity to see them have their lunch, normally consisting of fruit, apples, strawberries etc only the best for these little guys.

At the forest, quite a few of the monkey you will see in the trees, so as you walk around be sure to look up in the air to make sure you spot them all. At one particular location, on the occasions that I have been the Alpha Male always takes pride of place and sits there just letting everyone admire him as they pass by.

On all occasions of my visits, each visit has been different and on the last occasion, I found that there had been a lot of new additions to the forest as there were numerous baby Barbary Macaques around. All comical in there own little ways you find that they spend most of the day chasing each other around, swingiing and falling from branches of the trees and possibly fighting to get to that one last strawberry left. I found myself standing for half an hour just observing five small monkeys jumping from branch to branch, chasing after each other and generally being rather entertaining.

There are guide all throughout the forest, who will give you a brief intorduction as you enter the forest and to remind you that you are walking in their territory and this is their home. These monkeys roam freely and very often cross you path as you are walking or come and stand next to you and perch themselves on a fence. The guide regularly do talks at mealtimes and give you guidance on the history of this particular species on monkey, raising the public awareness of how to protect them and how to create and preserve the species by increasing the population of theese particular monkeys. Over 600 of this particular species have already been introduced back into the Atlas mountains of Morocco as their natural habitat. There are numerous information panels in and around the parks that give you questions and a box to open to find the answers.

The forest is very hilly and unfortunately I could not recommend to anyone with particular walking difficulties as there are a lot of steep banks around the forest. Make sure you wear flat shoes as I had heels on and had to having piggy backs down the hills.. haha..

On average you can spend a good half a day at the forest. In the summer it great to pack a picnic or take advantage of the cafe they they have their which sell snacks, ice creams and beverages and it has extreemly nice surrounding to sit in. YOu could also take advantage of popping next door to the Trentham Village and do a spot of shopping.

The forest itseelf at the moment is closed until February. Entrance fees for last year were £5.50 for adults and £4.00 for children. Under three's go in free of charge.

Situated from the M6 at junction 15, follow the A34 direction and it is signposted from Stone.

Its a great couple of hours out, kids will love it and so will adults. I can't wait to return again this year.

Summary: Help Preserve there Lives