Port Lympne Animal Reserve, Kent - Kids Go Free in September 2019

We've been to Port Lympne animal reserve a few times now and each visit has been so much fun. We've been in the summer when it was super busy and during a week day when the kids are at school and it feels like we're the only ones there (we're not!), and both occasions have been great fun. Earlier this week when most of the East Sussex and Kent schools had gone back we headed to Port Lympne with my mum and brother to visit for the first time. They'd heard so many great things from me that they didn't want to stay away.

Port Lympne is set is picturesque countryside, but it is quite a steep hill, so I was interested to see how we'd all cope as mum has COPD, I've got calf issues currently and my brother had a knee op earlier this year. I was so impressed that when I mentioned mum's condition to any of the staff they told me I could approach any member of staff with a radio, if we needed to, and they would get a minibus to take mum back to the top. It turned out we didn't need to, as we took it easy on the hills, made use of all the appropriately positioned benches and stopped to look at the animals as we went.

On the day we visited it was raining terribly when we awoke and we weren't too keen to wander around in the rain, so we left it a while for the weather to clear and thankfully by the time we got there at 1pm the skies were blue and the sun had come out. Mum was a little worried that we wouldn't get long at the park as we had only arrived at lunchtime but thankfully it doesn't close until 6.30pm, so we had plenty of time.