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On Friday Suzie_Q and I travelled back from our short overnight stay at Lulworth Cove in Dorset, but not before popping into world reknowned Monkey World Ape Rescue Centre in Wareham. Jim Cronin - the founder of Monkey World, sadly passed away in March this year (Liver Cancer) after creating Dorset’s refuge for monkeys rescued from the illegal pet trade, laboratories and other cruel circumstances. Hopefully Jim’s demise won’t see the closure of this wonderful centre though - it’s one of the only ‘zoos’ I can think of where the inhabitants are given lots of space and as close to natural habitat as possible following their previously traumatic lives.

Throughout most of the morning the Siamang Gibbons were singing together up in the branches of some pine trees, a most peculiar sound echoing all around the Monkey World grounds. I captured a short blast and put it on youtube. Suzie_Q had queried why the chimpanzees didn’t also have trees in their large enclosure but it later transpired that chimpanzees like to tear trees to pieces - and since they couldn’t keep being relocated like they do in the wild, they have heavy duty climbing frames instead. We did find it quite ironic to discover the huge children’s play area - climbing frames not too dissimilar to those available to the chimpanzees, full of children acting just like chimps by swinging tyres and jumping up and down on them.

If you’re a fan of Chimpanzees, Orangutans, Gibbons, Capuchins, Macaques and Lemurs, do pay a visit to Monkey World if you get the opportunity. Don’t worry about not having any children as an excuse for a visit either, from the eavesdropping I did on numerous ‘childless’ couples of all ages, most were frequent visitors and sponsors paying close attention to the growth of the individual monkeys in residence.

A great venue for lunch, not a million miles from Monkeyworld is the World’s End Inn at Blandford Forum outside of Winterborne Zelston. We spotted this picturesque public house on our way down to Lulworth Cove. Not quite remembering where it was we originally stopped for lunch after Monkey World at the ‘Botany Bay’ pub but the grumpy barmaid told us they’d stopped serving at 2:30pm. To our joy we rediscovered the World’s End pub just one minute further along the A31. Here we found very friendly staff serving food all day, the ploughman’s lunches we both ordered were generous and tasty… the desserts of pancakes or chocolate brownies to die for! Definitely one venue we’ll remember for our next trip to Dorset.

Technorati Tags: monkey world, monkeys, zoo, dorset, animal rescue, chimp, chimpanzee, orangutan, capuchin, macaque, lemur, jim cronin, dorset, lulworth

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