Parc Animalier de Merlet

After a long exhausted hiking trip on the day before, we wanted to take things easy and spend a day in slow & relax mode.

Sons wanted to go to Chamonix Leisure Park again, they remember very well about the good times they had had there in last year. But husband had found another place which he thinks is worth going too. He planed to take us to visit an animal park where we can get to see the animals move freely in the park, without enclosure.

Sounds interesting. So, off we go....

It was a beautiful sunny day. We saw many paragliders having their fun up there along the way.

I will never have the guts to try this out. So, I can only imagine how does it feel when soaring up in the sky like this.

Husband had parked our car as near the park as possible, so that we won't need to consume too much of our energies.

Though we had parked our car at the nearest place to the park, we still need to walk uphill, for about 300 m (Gasp).

The place is called Merlet. It is a "village" or the mountain hamlet where family used to live with two or three cows, some chickens and planted potatoes for the winter. These people were so poor that when men played cards during the long winter evenings, they were betting on pieces of land rather than money. Gosh, that's called poor?

After 15 min walking, finally we reached the entrance gate.

The park is call Parc Animalier de Merlet, located at 1563 m altitude.

Soon when we entered the park, we get to see Mont Blanc Massif on the opposite side. Spectacular view.

Of course the place is not free entry. Husband got to buy the tickets for 4 of us (Adult : € 6.00, Children 4-14 years : € 4.00).

The animals are released. They stayed on the trails, we could watch them without scaring them away.

The tenant who stood there to greet the visitors.

Vincent said : Hey, can you people go now?

Looking at them walking side by side always warm my heart. I wish to see them walking side by side like this until the day I leave this beautiful world.

There is nothing too fancy about the park, everything is so down-to-earth.

except this restaurant with splendid views of the Mont Blanc.

Guess the owner had won this big piece of land when he gambled with his neighbours in some cold winter time.

A very lucky man he is...

The park is quite big, occupies an area of 20 hectars. It said we would meet the ibex, chamois, sheep, deer, llamas and marmots in there.

Magnificent view. How nice if we can build a house facing the mountains.

Cool dad & cool baby.

We thought this park would be an easy one, but walking uphill was quite energy consuming.

Son was demonstrating his special skill to swallow a whole "giant sausage".

The so-called "giant sausage".

We didn't get to see any animals along this path, that made the boys groaned a lot.

Said William : don't tell me this is the animal I'm gonna to see in the park ya....

I got to console him that many animals were awaiting for him just in front, sigh.

Still no sight of any animals, sigh.

Such a major disappointment for son.

Finally, we get to see some deers when he walked downhill. This made the kids freaking thrilled for a while.

Obviously, we are nobody to those deers. They just ignored us completely.

The deers are so peaceful that soon, everyone just left them alone.

We continued to walk downhill.

Although this is not an exotic place for the grown up, it can easily please the very small children...

Even to the not-so-young children, this place is still a natural playground .

This is also a very safe place that we didn't bother to stop him from practicing his balancing skill this way.

So much space for them to run around madly.

They thought they were some sort of smart engineers who can block the stream from flowing its way.

well, no harm to let them indulge in their own imagination.

Always tell him to show me only when he picked a diamond from there, but he still has the habit to show me whatever he got.

20 minutes later, we walked to the other side of the park...

Hello marmotte, where are you?

Wild mushrooms, bet they are poisonous.

Took a short break here to admire the opposite scenery.

William said he can help to take some nice photos for me, as I always did for him. Yes, he can, too.

I think not too long later, we will become his adult models instead.

And probably some more years later, he won't be interesting to take photos for his old mom, but other pretty girls.

Chamonix valley

Husband said we should walked that way, said maybe we will have more luck to bump into some animals. Well, whatever, I didn't really care.

Ahaa...saw a goat sitting in his cave watching TV.

Walked a few more steps, and saw this goat staring at a human kid.

This one was staring at me...

Brothers? Sisters? Lovers? Enemies?

Look at his horns, so cool.

Yes, you have very cool horns too.

Too bad he just sat there like a statue, but not deer-walking to entertain the audiences.

This one is more showing off, think she is very confident of her appearance.

They boys stood here for a very long time, expecting something but couldn't tell what exactly is the thing they wished to happen.

Guess they just waited for the goat to walk closer and closer to them.

Well, we just let them be. After all, not that they can get to see these goats every day.

Just when I was about to walk away, the goats decided to give us a good show.

Finally, they played goat-fighting to amuse the audiences.

The show is a good one, with the ending one being pushed down by the other. Bravo !

The winner.

Yeah, I knew they were expecting for the goats to walk near them.

I think we have made a short connection to one another in a quiet way.

When we continued the walk, we saw some more goats, shy one.

We just said "Hi", and then "Bye" to him.

This one is more outgoing. I think she would befriend with the boys if only we gave them more time to make the connection.

Vincent was very reluctant to go...

After many times calling, he still stood there, wishing to make friend with the deer.

Yo, let's go.

A deer came to say good bye to us.

Though feeling tempted, we didn't dine here simply for good views. That's because we really were not hungry, plus husband said he would take us to a even beautiful place for lunch.

The berries tree in front of the restaurant.

Saw the llamas who enjoyed being pat on head by the visitors.

Too bad they didn't smell good, so no one could sit with them for a long time.

We left the park at around 12 noon, then heading straight to our next destination...

Husband said our next destination would be somewhere around that glancier area. Looks great to me.

Aiguille du Midi is merely a needle as view from here...