Things to do in Central Bedfordshire

Woburn Safari Park in Bedfordshire opened in 1970 as one of the first drive-through safari parks in Britain and remains one of the most popular and extensive wildlife parks in the country, set within the grounds of the Woburn Estate and combining a traditional drive-through safari experience with a substantial walk-through and interactive section. The combination of significant acreage, a high density of charismatic large mammals and a strong conservation programme has maintained its position as one of the premier wildlife experiences available outside of a major zoological garden. The drive-through safari reserve covers several hundred acres divided into different zones, each representing a broadly different wildlife habitat region. Visitors drive their own vehicles slowly through enclosures housing lions, tigers, giraffes, elephants, white rhinoceroses, bison, bears and a large variety of African and Asian ungulates that graze the pastures on either side of the road at close range. The African lion section and the White Rhino enclosure are consistent highlights, and the experience of having a giraffe crane its neck to investigate the roof of your car through the open window is one that visitors remember for years. The foot safari section provides close encounters with a further range of species including penguins, meerkats, sea lions, lemurs and smaller primates. Keeper talks and feeding demonstrations take place throughout the day at various enclosures and provide educational context for the animals on display. Woburn Safari Park contributes to international conservation through membership of the European Endangered Species Programme and participates in coordinated breeding programmes for several threatened species. The Père David's deer herd at the adjacent Woburn Abbey estate, a species that owes its survival in significant part to the Woburn collection, is one of the most historically significant conservation achievements associated with the broader estate. The park is best visited on a weekday outside school holidays to avoid the heaviest crowds, and a full visit including both the drive-through and foot safari comfortably occupies a whole day.

ZSL Whipsnade Zoo sits on the escarpment of the Chiltern Hills in Bedfordshire, its 243 hectares of open downland and wooded parkland providing one of the largest and most spacious zoo environments in Europe. The white chalk figure of a lion cut into the hillside below the zoo has been visible for miles across the vale since it was created in 1933, a landscape-scale advertisement for the zoo's presence that has become one of the informal landmarks of the Bedfordshire countryside. Whipsnade opened in 1931 as a country sister site to London Zoo, conceived from the beginning as a place where animals would be kept in conditions more closely resembling their natural environment than urban zoo cages could provide. The open paddocks, large enclosures and the ability of many species to be kept in outdoor conditions year-round in this relatively mild chalk downland setting represented a significant philosophical advance in zoo management and influenced the development of zoo design internationally throughout the following decades. The Chiltern escarpment setting provides both an exceptional backdrop for the zoo and a landscape of significant ecological interest in its own right. The chalk downland of the Chilterns supports one of the most important semi-natural grassland ecosystems in southern England, with plant communities of exceptional diversity that survive on the thin, nutrient-poor chalk soils above the escarpment. The views from the zoo's higher ground extend north across the entire Bedfordshire plain toward Northamptonshire, with the flat agricultural landscape stretching to the horizon in a panorama of considerable scale. The zoo's large animal collection includes substantial herds of white rhino, Asiatic elephants, giraffes and many species of deer and antelope that roam paddocks large enough to allow natural herd behaviour and movement. The Sea Lion lake, the Cheetah Rock and the penguin pool are among the established visitor favourites, while the Wild Asia and Heart of Africa sections represent more recent investment in immersive habitat design.

ZSL Whipsnade Zoo in the Chiltern Hills of Bedfordshire is the largest zoo in the United Kingdom by area, covering approximately 600 acres of downland above the Vale of Aylesbury that provides space for the large animal enclosures and open paddocks in which the zoo's exceptional collection of large mammals, birds and other species is housed. Whipsnade was opened by the Zoological Society of London in 1931 as a country complement to the urban ZSL London Zoo, the spacious downland site providing conditions in which large animals including Asian elephants, white rhinos, giraffes and the large herd of European bison could be maintained in environments far more appropriate to their needs than the confined spaces of a city zoo. The zoo's position on the Chiltern escarpment gives it exceptional views over the Vale of Aylesbury below and a setting of considerable natural beauty, the combination of the open downland, the ancient beech woods at the scarp edge and the extensive grassland within the zoo creating an environment with its own intrinsic landscape value. The chalkhill blue and other butterfly species that use the unimproved chalk grassland within the zoo's perimeter are a reminder of the ecological value of this site beyond its role as an animal collection. The drive-through section of the zoo, through which visitors in their own cars pass the paddocks containing large herbivores in a format reminiscent of a safari park, provides a different experience from the walking sections and allows closer approach to animals in open enclosures. The combined effect of the drive-through and the walking exhibits makes Whipsnade a full-day destination of considerable variety. The Asian elephant herd at Whipsnade is one of the most significant in Europe and the zoo's elephant management and breeding programme is a major contribution to the conservation of this endangered species.

Woburn Abbey in Bedfordshire is the historic seat of the Russell family, Dukes of Bedford, one of the great Whig aristocratic families who shaped the political and cultural history of Britain from the sixteenth century to the present day. The estate, covering approximately 3,000 acres of parkland and the famous Woburn Safari Park, has been in the Russell family's possession since Henry VIII dissolved the Cistercian abbey that previously occupied the site and granted the land to the family following their support for the Reformation. The current house, rebuilt in the Palladian style in the mid-eighteenth century, contains one of the most significant private art collections in Britain. The paintings assembled by successive Dukes of Bedford include works by Rembrandt, Canaletto, Gainsborough, Reynolds and Velázquez among many others, and the Canaletto Room alone, hung with paintings commissioned to record the state rooms of the Bedford London residence before its demolition, is one of the most remarkable single rooms in any English country house. The collection of French furniture and Sèvres porcelain is equally impressive and reflects the cosmopolitan collecting ambitions of the eighteenth-century Russells. The parkland surrounding the house was landscaped in the eighteenth century and contains one of the most celebrated deer parks in England, home to nine species of deer including the rare Père David's deer, a species extinct in the wild in China and preserved at Woburn since the late nineteenth century. The eleventh Duke of Bedford's decision to open the house and park to the public in 1955 made Woburn Abbey one of the pioneers of the heritage tourism industry in Britain, a model that many other aristocratic families subsequently followed. The formal grounds near the house include a Chinese dairy designed by Henry Holland, a sculpted garden and a riding school of elegant Georgian design. The proximity of Woburn Safari Park, separately managed but accessible as part of a combined ticket, allows visitors to combine the house visit with one of England's best-known wildlife attractions on the same day.