Children’s park with more than 1,300 different species of birds. HOURS: Every day from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. PRICES:
LOCATION: Calle Majadita 14, Guinate-Máguez, Lanzarote INFORMATION: +34 928 835 500.
MAP OF LOCATION:
The Guinate tropical park is a place for leisure and children’s education in Lanzarote. About one thousand birds and exotic animals coexist in an area of about 14 acres [45,000 square meters]. Surrounded by nature, in the quiet village of Guinate, in the north of Lanzarote, more than 1,300 different species of birds coexist, along with a few species of ostriches, monkeys and turtles. Therefore, it is an ideal place for children, and the not-so-young, to get lost, enchanted in the animal world.
A lot of vegetation surrounds the facilities of the Guinate Tropical Park, which along with the altitude of the place, some 600 meters [1,800 feet] above sea level, make it advisable to bring a coat along. The attractions follow a circular path. The starting point draws the visitor’s attention to the colors and gracefulness of the parrots that are in this first station. You can see a multitude of exotic birds, mostly from Africa and Asia. From these first steps you can see some information about the species shown, but hardly enough for those with a deeper curiosity and a higher learning capacity: our children.
The small bird breeding station is very interesting. It is structured in a closed area, independent from the rest of the park, a suspicious invitation on the green entrance gives way to the retirement place of hundreds of these small birds that are being bred. The usual silence is broken by the chorus of wing flapping of different groups that remind us, although in a different dimension, of Tippi Heddren in Alfred Hitchcock’s mythical Birds.
From the incipient state of maturity of the birds in breeding we are one step away from the slim figure of the ostriches (see picture on the left). That long and slim neck powerfully attracts our attention, in contrast with its wide hips and extremely thin legs. They look so quiet, and with such fragile anatomy, that those changes of rhythm and the high speeds they are capable of reaching when necessary seem unthinkable. The ostriches are accompanied by a varied group of pheasants and next to them there are different species of cockatoos in cages.
Another area in the tropical park is the “large cage”. It looks like a greenhouse. Inside, it houses different macaws, turtles, more exotic birds from Africa, Australia, Asia and India, and a large aquarium where the showy Koi carp fish is bred in a big pond surrounding the large cage, also enveloped by streams of water.
The time dedicated to children is set at half past every hour during the tropical park’s opening hours (Monday to Friday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.). At 11:30, 12:30, 1:30, 2:30, 3:30 and 4:30 the shot marking the start of the parrot show is fired.