Wow! Gorillas!
I've had great fun playing spot the gorilla in Bristol over the past couple of months. Just like the pigs and lions in Bath previously, various gorilla designs have been placed around the city with a view of providing a fun way to see Bristol and eventually raise cash for charity.
The added twist this time is the gorillas are helping to celebrate Bristol Zoo's 175th birthday and to raise awareness of conservation issues. I particularly liked finding the pictured 'zoo keeper' when I met my GNO pals for dinner at Cabot Circus back in July, and as you can see he (?) was putting a smile on the faces of passers by :)
You have just a few days to see them for yourself as they're being rounded up and corralled back at the zoo after September 6th. You can download your copy of the trail map from the Wow! Gorillas website* - there's 61 of them to find. I've seen about 20 whilst mooching around the city centre for a couple of hours without really trying.
I rather like the fact there's a couple of wandering gorillas one of which is currently visiting Birmingham; another is floating around wherever The Matthew is headed in the harbour. There'll be a last chance to all the gorillas at the zoo on September 24-28th, prior to the auction on the 29th. The usual entrance charges will apply, though the wandering gorilla will have returned from Brum and you'll be able to see it for free outside.
Don't forget the zoo also has a firm horticultural links (it is short for zoological gardens after all) as it hosts the national collections of Hedychiums and Caryopteris. All the more reason for heading there soon and a perfect excuse for me to provide a link to this You Tube time lapse video of the gardens team at work :)
* = do have a look at the website anyway - it's fab, particularly the gorillas aboard the Bristol ferry boats :)
If you are going to Bristol specially, also head for Nelson Street and the street art there. An interesting enhancement of previously very dreary concrete.
ReplyDelete61? 61! Who on earth decided that what this campaign needed was exactly 61 gorillas? There is something fabulously random about this.
ReplyDeleteLu - thanks for the reminder - it's on the To Do list :)
ReplyDeleteDawn - I know! The ones in Bath have been around the 100 mark. 175 would have been good. I wonder if it's 1 gorilla for every nnn in the wild, or just the number of sponsors they could get