Tourist & Leisure Attractions - Monkey World

Here we are then inside Monkey World at the start of our wander round to see all the apes, monkeys and other primates.  The centre map behind us helpfully pinpointed all the areas to visit...

...throughout the 65 acres of Dorset woodland and spot the 16 different primate species living in their natural environment.  And as you can see, there were also a lot of human species at Monkey World too!

This is Alex, a gibbon, with baby in tow.  Baby gibbon had to hang on for dear life as mother leapt wildly around the large enclosure.  Meanwhile...

...in the huge chimpanzee enclosure it was interesting to notice that the primates have a strict social pecking order with a dominant (alpha) male in charge.

We wondered who got the most out of Monkey World; us looking at them or them looking at us!  The monkeys could view us for free, but we had to pay £9.

The keepers gave frequent and informative talks and were happy to answer questions, seen here at the Nursery Chimps enclosure.

One for the 'awww' factor!  The guy lying down was enjoying being preened by the ape above.

Monkey World has many elevated viewing areas where a good view of the primates could be had.

Yum?  No sign of lunch so I'll just eat this twig I've broken off the tree!  This little guy certainly made a meal of the abundant vegetation.

This is a Capuchin monkey.  He was running back and forth, pausing, rubbing his tummy and looking up the path outside his enclosure.  We think he was looking out for the keeper to bring his lunch!  Read all about Dorset's monkeys on the Monkey World website in our UK tourist resources.

Some of the primates adopted some rather uncomfortable looking positions on their equipment in the enclosures.  This fellow looks like he's had a mishap with the fur dye, whoops!

Here's an Orangutan pausing to have her picture taken.  Many of the monkeys seemed to realise people wanted to take their picture and were happy to stop monkeying around and pose.

It was good to see the Monkey World monkeys had plenty of room and equipment to climb, swing and chase each other on.  They ran around so fast it was often difficult to get a picture.

We watched these two guys playing for a while, then the poor monkey below was swung back and forth by the scruff of the neck before being dropped to the ground by the one above - then coming back for more!

Belinda's here with our friend Bob checking out the information point on the woodland walk which...

...led to the ring-tailed Lemurs who liked to wrap their tail round their face when sleeping.  Further on...

...we saw these stump-tailed Macaques checking each other for fleas - looks like they could do with rubbing some sunscreen in too!  Opened in 1987, Monkey World is disabled visitor friendly and another nearby Dorset attraction is Bovington Tank Museum.

No trip to Monkey World is complete without a visit to the gift shop and getting Mike to buy you your very own little monkey (but you've already got one Belinda)!  When in Dorset, Monkey World is definitely worth a day's visit, so gets a thumbs up from us!