Dudley Zoo

I remember Dudley Zoo from when I visited as a child.  I remember looking down on tigers, Polar Bears and lions. 

Looking up the hill towards the Zoo

I went there with my children, several times over the years by bus but not since the early eighties.

My last visit was by car and,

although this view is the same (more or less),

there was a car park just before the cinema so that we walked up the road to the entrance.  The bus stop was opposite this building - to this day I don't know if it is a cinema or not!!!

The entrance with all its turnstiles, sometimes with queues as a school trip arrived the same time!! 

the Chairlift can just be seen behind
the turnstiles



 

The Flamingo Pool was on the left as we entered and the path meandered round to the top of the hill. 

We could get on the Chair Lift but, as I have a thing about heights, we would walk up the hill to the Giraffes.  I can't find a photo of these but if I do I will update.  

I am amazed how crowded the place is in this b/w picture taken back in the 1950s. 

On the left is the 'funfair' which consisted of a few stalls, penny arcade and a roundabout.

I seem to remember that most of the larger animals were kept in 'pits', formed by rather iconic buildings, which apparently are part of a conservation order. This in 2009 - http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1218811/Tecton.html - and this - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UAJ0sW36I80

but this was how the visit was – almost!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gnXE7kiwGYQ&feature=related – music is a distraction and the pictures are not too clear but …….. it was the 1960s and that's how it was.

I remember looking down on the animals, one time the adult with me sat me on the wall that was round the Polar Bear pit and I was terrified, they had to really hold onto me.

Polar Bears!!!

I notice in later videos on youtube that there are rails right round these pits and that the insides are turfed. 

Sealions

I really will have to go and update my knowledge..............

I think the last time that I was there C was about 4 or 5 and had a habit of walking around with her hands in her pockets of her coat, no matter how many times she was told to take them out, back in they went.

On this particular day we were with a friend and her two children and, as childrend do, they were running everywhere.  At the entrance to the Reptile House, C tripped up the steps and, not having any hands to save herself, badly grazed her chin.

The Cafe

There was no First Aid centre that we could see (1983ish) so we went along to the Café to see if they had a plaster or the like.  The staff were very good and we managed to wash it and put a sort of dressing over it but I am afraid she had to walk round with this big white dressing just under her chin – but she never put her hands in her pockets again!!!

I don't remember this train running round the Zoo when I was a child, 

although I would almost put money on that we, as a family, would have had a ride on it.  My mother loved this sort of thing.

The castle itself has not changed much on the outside.  Still a ruin and, whenever we went, the children could scrabble all over it although, I remember that one of the rooms was being 'dressed' to look like it would have at the time of building.  I think they were going to use it as a 'classroom' for the schools.

1938

2000



I understand that the Zoo owners present 'Ghost Nights' there nowadays and I am sure that C and her friend have been to one or two. 

There were no ghosts when I was a child!!!!