kingdom of zion

I have been a fan of ZWP for year, watching the Lion Man repeats on British TV so I was extremely excited about this and it lived up to my expectations. I paid $60.00 on a GrabOne Voucher (normal cost $80.00 - Make sure you get the GrabOne's early as they sell out fast) and went for the Enrichment Tour as it was an opportunity to watch the big cats with 'enrichment play' so they were more active. This could be a shoe box with treats in, a frozen ice cube (perfect for the hot days), balls thrown in etc. The animals seem content and looked healthy and the grounds are being developed to account for bigger enclosures.The staff are very passionate about their cause and you can tell they care with talks about expansion plans, animal treatment and health. However there is an underlying bitterness with regards to the past owners and their opinion on the treatment of the animals. It may be good to do some research before you go in terms of the the ownership of the animals and the change in hands and re-branding the park has ensured over the past few years. The 'Lion Man' Craig Busch works in a contractor role within the park splitting his time overseas whilst the team are committed to regaining the health of the big cats, getting the park up and running and developing the grounds. They are open about the history of the park and what their future vision is which is why I do not mind paying the entrance fee to go towards this.The pro's are that the guides are incredibly experienced and safety is paramount. I doubt I will ever experience a small group scenario and get to come close to these magnificent animals againAs for the con's I think that 1.5 hours is just a little short for the door price, round it up to 2-2 1/2 hours or maybe put in a half hour presentation or video to watch to add to the overall experience. For that reason it has been given 4 stars but when this attraction is in full swing it will be amazing. I do hope they get the funding they deserve.

I took my young Grandson to this..the tour we did was the feeding tour...very impresive and exciting for Dan.Very well run, felt very safe and a much better experience than seeing Lions in the Zoo.Lion man was happy to have photos taken with the children, and he is what makes it so good.Well worth a visit..

The cost of entry seems a little high especially when you first arrive at the gates. All you can see is the little ticket house and a couple of pens.Don't worry because it's all hidden in the bush and you cant see it all, this is really something to see when in Whangarei, the people who run it are all volunteers and very passionate about the park and it's tigers.I bet everyone will walk away from this with at least on tid bit of information they didn't know about tigers.

I always thoroughly enjoyed my tours, the cats are beautiful and have their own individual, undeniable personalities. By far and above the most professional, knowledgeable guide is Emma. If you love cats and have an affinity with them you won't forget this experience.

We visited from the UK after watching the Lion Man. So this was very exciting for us. We had a tour round the park and were able to meet a White Lion, followed by and walk and meet with a Tiger. It was truley amazing an experience I will never forget.

Finally after years of wanting to do this I got to visit it on the weekend. I wondered when I saw the sign in Whangarei what we were going to when it said 11 kilometres. Not that far away from the town, we drove past a Kindergarten on the way and I thought gosh this is close. So we continued the drive and soon were in the beautiful stone walled countryside. I stunning drive out and eventually the sign appeared for us to turn left. We pulled up outside in the carpark still wondering what we had arrived at! Paid our entry fee at $80 per adult and walked through the door where we could see cages in the distance and and first view of these magnificent animals. The first roars were heard within minutes, I now knew this was going to be an amazing experience. Our guide Georgie appeared, she couldn't have been a better guide, full of passion and a great credit to the Kingdom of Zion, so passionate about the cause and the love the of Lions. We started our walk down a drive to the cages, the property is well cared for and we could see is very well run. Our journey to each Lion had it's own story with plenty of time for photos and close encounters. We were one metre away from them in many cases and all in full view. An unbelievable experience when walking between cages and the Lions start roaring. This is definitely the next best thing to going to Africa to see these amazing animals. I thought the price was relative to the experience and quite happy with it. I will definitely recommend this to my friends and family and don't forget to take your camera, you will never get better photos than here at this Park. The tour was 1 1/2 hours.

We were lucky to get half price tickets for the Enrichment tour and were there on the day they were filming so we were there for 2.5 hours. It was fantastic, the girl who took us round was very good at her job and kept us informed for the whole tour. The animals are amazing especially when they all roared at the same time and the sound was unreal. Highly recommend it.

Firstly thank you very much for taking the time to share your feedback with us. We are disappointed that you did not fully enjoy your tour here as much as we would have liked, if you could contact us with some more information like the day you came for your tour and what kind of tour then we will be able to look into this further, find out why it was not up to standard and make sure it does not happen again. Call us on 09 435 0110 or email at office@kingdomofzion.co.nz.Regarding the information on tours, sometimes we are slightly off, no one is always 100% perfect with information. However we do stick by what we said, for instance we say the cheetah run an average speed of 100km/h and that is not incorrect, but you are right in the fact they can go faster, in fact there top speed is approx. 120km/h.Most concerning is the differences in prices that you were given, so again we would like to find out more about that and make sure it does not happen again. I can only imagine that perhaps it was an in store promotion we had over that weekend and then you were given the option of which voucher you would like to use. If that’s the case then a lot of the time we do recommend using the in store promotion as when you come for your next visit you still have that voucher you can use. Win win! Again thank you for leaving your feedback, and we look forward to hearing from you.

We attended the feeding tour of the big cats. Great knowledge by the guide and wonderful to see the big cats rip into their meals. It was a great experience. Side note: It would be great to see some businesses sponsor some money to build some new enclosures.

Thank you for such lovely feedback, it’s awesome to hear how much you enjoyed your visit. We all do our very best by the cats and the results are rewarding. We love sharing what we have here with people like you, hoping that everyone learns something new on each visit. We look forward to seeing you back here at some point, you should definitely book in for the cheetah encounter, amazing experience!

Enclosures too small but animals looked healthy and they can only do what they can do with limited budget. Need to register as a charity to get more help.

a great experience as you are pretty up close and personal; we did the feeding tour so their close attention was guaranteed.. highly recommended; check your GPS though as the signposting is not wonderful...

Thank you for your feedback. We are very happy to hear that you enjoyed your visit here at Zion and we look forward to seeing you back here again. :)

We took our two nieces there during the April school holidays and they really enjoyed it. There is a 5 year age difference between them and it is hard to find things that a teenager and an 8 year old are happy to do together. They took lots of photos and asked questions which the lovely guide was very happy to answer. We are off to Tanzania in October to see these wonderful creatures in the wild but it was great to see those beautiful creatures up close. Recommend that you go on feeding days which is only three days per week Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. Enjoy!!!!!

Thank you for visiting kingdom of Zion, we are glad to hear that you enjoyed your visit here.Cats in the wild sleep up to 20 hours per day, however they are more active around feed and enrichment time, as you witnessed. It would be great to have a café here and hopefully one day in the future we will have one on site. Unfortunately we are not allowed any hands on contact with big cats over the age of 1 in New Zealand and that rule applies to all staff at Kingdom of Zion. Thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback and we hope to see you back here again soon!