Pawnshop magnate to open safari park to public by April

CEBU, Philippines — The Philippine's largest nature theme park, the Cebu Safari Adventure and Adventure Park in the municipality of Carmen announced to officially open by April this year.

This was announced by the park's chief operating officer (COO) and vice president Eduard Jarque Loop yesterday.

Although the 170-hectare safari park had been accepting bookings during weekend since December last year, Loop said the company will do its full-swing marketing and promotions once it will officially open, as well as add more animal species, adventure activities, and other support facilities.

At present, the Safari park initially houses 111 animal species sourced mostly from Africa and other countries.

By this year, Loop said the company, which is under the M. Lhuillier Group will be offering four adventure rides such as the  activities such as the 1.3 kilometers zipline, obstacle course, giant swing, sky bicycle.

Currently, the park accepts booking on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, and limits up to 600 people.

"We still have to fix the power supply. So, we could operate the kitchen properly already," added Loop.

The safari park started as a personal property of pawnshop magnate Michel Lhuillier to host his collections of animals and flora.

Today, Lhuillier is sharing his personal collection to everybody to enjoy and even to learn from. About 80 percent of the park's employees are from Carmen.

Cebu Alliance of Travel Operations Services (CATOs) Alice Queblatin said that what is interesting about the park is the interplay of flora and animals living in their natural habitat.

The safari park is part of the 2,000 hectare property owned by Lhuillier in barangay Norte, Carmen, Cebu. It plans to build more facilities by 2020 such as a 60-room hotel, camp sites, among others.

Aside from tourists, the park also is attracting and making itself conducive for educational tours.  The park has a group of Science consultants from Australia, Sri Lanka and Singapore and Czec Republic.

If not the largest Safari Park in Asia Pacific, certainly, the Cebu Safari and Adventure Park is the biggest (in terms of size) in the Philippines, confirmed Queblatin. (FREEMAN)