Sassy Mama Field Trip: Jurong Bird Park

I don’t like birds. For many reasons I guess: the Avian Flu, Mr. Hitchcock, the fact that they enjoy eating worms or simply an envy of their ability to fly. But my Little E is OBSESSED with birds at the moment, which I’m obviously less than thrilled about, although I suppose snakes would have been worse. After putting it off since November, last Sunday we decided that it was time to face my feather-related fears with a trip to Jurong Bird Park. A mama’s got to do what a mama’s got to do, right?

We cabbed it there from River Valley, which took about 20 minutes and set us back roughly $20. Once there, the entry fee of (another) $20 per adult is very reasonable and kids below the age of three get free entry, which is great!

Just on your right after you enter the park is a dark “night house”, where the nocturnal birds live. My kids were thrilled to be walking around the dark house, which was due to a combination of excitement over the birds but also the fact that they’ve never been out walking about in the dark. Bedtime is 7.30pm (sharp!) chez this mama.

When buying our tickets we had paid an extra $5 to get access to the train that takes you around inside the park. This however was a bit of a disappointment to us. Apparently up until six months ago there used to be a sky rail with a train running through the park. This has now been replaced by a mini train on the ground and as we know, birds tend to hang out in trees… See the challenge here?

Because of this it was a bit hard to see some of the birds, but the black swans as well as the flamingos standing on one leg went down really well with the little ones. And of course, riding around in the little train was a huge hit with the boys as well. One thing they should rethink though, is some of the information coming from the voice over during your ride, with fascinating facts like, “Here is the largest man-made waterfall inside a bird park in the world”. Um, ok…

We were rather lucky because we managed to get to the open theatre area at exactly 11 am, which is when they do one of their two shows per day. Some of the things were truly impressive, like the big birds that come flying down over the audience accompanied by some dramatic music and the fact that they’ve been trained so exceptionally well. But after 10 minutes or so the sitting down got a bit too much for the young crowd.

They also have a super nice and big wet play area called “Birdz of Play” but since both my kids had a bad cold coming on, we couldn’t really try it out this time. But it definitely looked worth coming back for!

All in all, a visit to Jurong Bird Park is honestly not as fun as going to the zoo. But given the beautiful surroundings, train ride and wet play area it’s definitely worth getting out of the house for.

Open 8.30am – 6pm every day

Jurong Bird Park, 2 Jurong Hill, Singapore 628925, Tel: (+65) 6265 0022

www.birdpark.com.sg