Inside West Midland Safari Park's luxurious tiger lodges which are now open for bookings
If you love being near big cats, then West Midland Safari Park's latest habitat lodges are for you.
The Bewdley park opened its Tiger Lodges last week; four new luxurious cabins for people to spend a night safely overlooking the park's Sumatran tigers.
West Midland Safari Park describes the lodges as 'luxurious', with some guests even allowed to watch the tigers from the comfort of a hot tub.
It's not a cheap experience: prices start at £790 per night for two guests, while additional adults are charged £175, children aged three-15 cost £125 and under threes £20 per night.
The lodges with hot tubs are detached, sleep five people and feature an open-plan living and dining area. All rooms have floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the Sumatran tiger habitat while the sunken hot tub is located in a covered garden area with another large, glass window offering a chance for people to get up close to the safari park's two examples of this endangered species.
Seven people can sleep in the double-storey lodges without a hot tub, which also contains downstairs master bedroom, living area with day bed and an additional bathroom and bedroom upstairs.
Those who book also get to enjoy a two-day admission ticket to the Safari Park and its attractions, breakfast and dinner, 24-hour concierge and widescreen TV.
The new lodges complement existing experiences in the cheetah, elephant, giraffe, rhino and red panda habitats, and are part of the brand-new tiger habitat, Tiger Tropics, which opened on Saturday.
Over recent weeks the two Sumatran tigers have been getting to know their new environment, and each other.
Nakal is an eight-year-old male who moved to West Midland Safari Park from London Zoo in 2016, while 10-year-old Dourga is a female who arrived from Fota Wildlife Park in Ireland in July this year.
Their new habitat has been designed to be enriching and encourage as many natural behaviours as possible. It includes scratching posts, exploration areas, vantage points, feeding points, two pools, heat pads and the planting in the habitat is a mix of tropical and native species, including bamboo.
It is estimated that there are fewer than 4,000 tigers left in the wild and only 400 of those are Sumatran tigers, gaining them their ‘critically endangered’ status from the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.
Stays at the lodge can be booked at www.safari-lodges.co.uk/tiger-lodge.
