We spent a lovely (if a little wet) week up in Scotland recently visiting family and having a bit of a chill with my sister and her boyfriend (Briony and Andrew). Me, Jon and Briony have seen most of the tourist sights over the years of us visiting there so decided to ask Andrew what he fancied seeing, he chose Edinburgh Zoo, which weirdly it turns out none of us had actually visited before. There was a reason Andrew chose the zoo though, a secret none of us knew about util this point…he is obsessed with Koala Bears, and Edinburgh Zoo is the only place in the UK which houses them!
So here is a few pictures from our time at the zoo, I should probably put a disclaimer here and say I hate Zoo’s!! As a lover of all animals, and having gone through a faze in my childhood where I was obsessed with wild animals I developed a bit of a dislike to animals being kept in captivity. But that being said I also understand the need in some cases for animals to be kept in captivity whether for their own safety, to aid in research to help keep the species alive or for other reasons, but I am still not a fan and would never have visited if it wasn’t for Andrews desperate need to see a real Koala in person. I am far more of a fan of places like Longleat where the animals have massive enclosures and are often left to live lives far more closely resembling that which they would in the wild (lion’s in packs for instance). But I did mostly enjoy my day walking around Edinburgh Zoo, and everyone else enjoyed themselves too.
I was actually pretty impressed by their large monkey and ape enclosures as they seemed to have plenty of room, lots to entertain them, plus the research and conservation the zoo are doing is pretty important and they are helping support the Budongo Forest Reserve in Uganda.
The other interesting piece of research for me and Jon was the Panda’s, having seen the Chengdu Panda Conservation and Research Centre when we were on Honeymoon in China we understand the importance of captive breeding for pandas (they are just too lazy!!) and Edinburgh Zoo had 2 pandas on load from China in the hope of learning more about them and hopefully successfully breeding them.
And of course we saw the Koalas! Which made Andrew very happy. Edinburgh Zoo have managed to successful breed the UK’s first UK born Koala in 2014 so they are helping increase the world Koala population (even if they are in captivity for now). 
They have lots of feedings and talks going on throughout the day so there is plenty to keep you entertained (other than the animals themselves) and you could easily spend an entire day there. There is also great cafe’s and restaurants, serving some locally produced products.
They were expanding and creating a few new enclosures when we were there, and they were expecting a few new arrivals, from other zoos and as part of their breeding programs. You can see whats new and whats happening at Edinburgh zoo by checking out their news page.
Lastly if you can’t make it to Edinburgh Zoo yourself you can always view one of the live stream webcams. They aren’t in ever enclosure but you can see the Pandas, Penguins or Squirrel Monkeys at the moment.
Just a note if you plan to visit! Edinburgh Zoo is located just on the outskirts of the city and spans itself over a rather steep hill, so there is lots of walking as you would expect, but it is also quite hard going as it is very steep in a number of places (more so when your 7 months pregnant!) so pushing a pushchair or something similar would be a little tiring.
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