# Penscynor Wildlife Park. Neath



## clay_9

Just thought I'd share this place with you guys.

Penscynor wildlife park was a wonderful place, it housed monkeys / chimps, rare birds, reptiles, penguins and various other wildlife. I can't find any details about it online as to its size before closure, I remember visiting it many times as a young lad before it closed in October 1998.

The site was redeveloped as a housing estate but there are some remains of various buildings and features. It's very easy to get to, it's just hidden slightly off a public footpath. Visited April 2011.

I can't remember what was housed in this area, there's an island sort of structure and a walkway stretching over the water.













There was an awesome toboggan ride there, there was a chair lift that took you towards the top of the hill and the run stretched through the forest on the side of the hill on its way back down. Best toboggan run I've ever been on. Nothing is left of the lift and practically all of the track was removed upon closure.








Some of the chair lift cable




The footbridge which was at the end of the run.




the other side of the hut, this is where you'd pay your pound and get on the chair lift.




A tiny part of the actual track can be seen sticking through the undergrowth




This is inside the reptile house, the compartments held various kinds of snakes, lizards etc
















Cages around the back, currently being used by some of the residents of the housing estate as a place to store wood.




This is one of the monkey/chimp enclosures




















This is directly under the last pic above, dark and scary




I went in, cautiously. 




Looking into here was pitch black, camera flash obviously helps for pics.




















'Monkey runs'








Looking up at where I was earlier












I think this is a run, the outer cage would have been higher and wider.




Looking up towards what I believe was the penguin arena












This was the window people could look through to see the penguins swimming around




From inside





Man thats a lot of photos. There really is hardly anything left, shame.


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## dangerous dave

please please please resize your pics to 600x800. full size jpgs like you have used take days to load and most people would get board of waiting for it to load i know i did


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## clay_9

Sorry, I guess I forget how fast my broadband is sometimes, I've reduced the size.


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## night crawler

Hey good report and photo's, looks agreat place to explore around.


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## smileysal

All the times I've gone down to South Wales to visit family, and we never went here. Was doing a search to find the place to take my little one the next time we were visiting, and found it was closed. 

Glad to see a lot of the former buildings etc are still there even though there's now houses on the site.

Excellent pics. 

Cheers,

 Sal


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## Captain-Slow

Seeing this has stirred up memories of school trips here way back in the mid 80's

Thanks for that.


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## bonniemcprice

some of the chimps and other animals are now at the wales ape and primate sanctuary see here: www.cefn-yr-erw.co.uk


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## Foxylady

Unusual explore and some interesting remains there. Love the chair lift hut and the penguin enclosure.
Cheers for posting Clay_9, and welcome to DP.


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## mookster

I love how nature is totally reclaiming it, looks a good wander that.


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## chizyramone

Captain-Slow said:


> Seeing this has stirred up memories of school trips here way back in the mid 80's
> 
> Thanks for that.



Too true Captain.

Those of us of a certain age from South and South West Wales went there on school trips, it was the law in those parts. 

And of course,the trips to Manor Park near Tenby.

Happy days


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## borntobemild

Remember taking the kids there about 1996. Lovely little place with staff who seemed genuinely enthusiastic.
A lot of the smaller zoos seem to have closed now. Bl**dy theme parks.


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## vplus-2008

used to go this place almost on a weekly basis as I had family living next to it, its sad to see it in such a state!

Will have to go and take a visit soon i think.


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## spacepunk

Looks like a fun explore, nice one.


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## Birchgrove184

Great photos. I remember going on a school trip once. Shame its gone. 

If you go to old-maps.co.uk, enter CILFREW and select the 1984 map, you can see the layout of the park.


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## alex76

Nice find i could spend hours in a place like that nice shots too


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## clay_9

Just thought I'd post this video that I created at this location. I'm a videographer and a comedy creator so the video is played for laughs, but you can see the locations that are in the pictures.

Interestingly, I shot this video in early October last year and there has been theft since then of metal surrounding the large enclousure with the waterfall. At 2mins 39 you can see the metal barrier sitting on top of the wall. in the pics I took above this is now gone.

[nomedia]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-U_dQF1Eqo[/nomedia]


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## chris_wales

I went there dozens of times as a youngster with my parents, was always a good day out. If i remember rightly that hut on island was for an ape ? 
Brings back some memories...


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