Colman: African Safari 九州自然動物園 (Japan, Oita)

I'm going to start off with one of my favourite attractions: The African Safari Park in Oita. This is the best zoo/park/safari I've ever been to and you'll find out why in a second.

So like y'know how animal feeding works in other places, where the animals are in the cage or behind a fence. African Safari has the most unique animal feeding. Instead of the animals being fed in the cage (or fence), you'll be in a caged bus which will enter the respective animal areas. So technically we're the animals here!

And I feel that it's really cool because we get the opportunity to feed the big cats rather than the usual harmless-vege-eating giraffes and zebras.

If you don't wanna spend money on the caged bus ride, simply head down to the pets area where all the cute animals are! There're monkeys which you can feed- again, I've never seen this anywhere else- with seeds which costs ¥100. These cute little things won't stop until they snatch the food between your fingers!!

My favorite attraction of all has got to be the guinea pig house. As the name suggests, it's a house of guinea pigs which the workers will help place on your lap. Do note that some guinea pigs are more timid than others so you have to be really careful when handling them. Obviously, if they start squirming around and squeaking it means that they're not comfortable with either the way you're holding them or you entirely.

They even have dog and cat houses, which requires an entry fee. The dogs are trained to sit on people's laps and if you're not attracting any dogs, you can request for a blanket, which the dogs are attracted to, and place it on your lap. There's this really cute dog (i think her name is miu or something like that) who literally follows me around the place and gets angry when I try to move her away from my lap. What a cutie

If you're not a dog person then head down to the cat house which is opposite. But I don't recommend this unless you're a super cat person because it's more expensive (i think 500) and the cats won't interact with you.

Lastly what makes this attraction such the BEST zoo/park/safari whatever is that there are good food!! Y'know how theme parks rip of their customers with expensive and below-standard food? This is not the case in African Safari. They have two restaurants- one that sells curry and pasta and the other one that sells curry and pasta (but better). The better one is located further in the attraction and even though they sell the same kind of food, I prefer the second one because it's actually a curry buffet, making it more worth it. There are 4 different kinds of curry of different spicy levels to cater to different tongues- beef, chicken, eggplant and sweet potato. I absolutely loved their eggplant and sweet potato, but if you're there you should definitely try all 4! If you're going in a group and there are people who doesn't like curry, there are also pastas which taste just as nice!

Perched atop a mountain, African Safari is definitely the most natural safari I've been to. Not only do the animals have a large area to roam freely, there's also minimum man-made structures in their living space. And while you're there, don't just pay attention to the animals because the scenery there is something else too!!