10 Best Things to Do in Colchester

Colchester Zoo is home to more than 260 different animal species from all over the world, including African lions, fennec foxes, spider monkeys and penguins. The zoo is designed in zones so that you're not just seeing animals in their natural habitats, but you're walking through neighborhoods of the world. These include the Edge of Africa, Kingdom of the Wild, Chimpanzee Lookout, Orangutan Forest and Wallaby Walkabout.

Each day, the zoo publishes an encounter timetable so you'll know when presentations and feeding sessions go on. Petting neighborhoods like the Sensation Station and the farm zone allow kids to get up close and personal with sheep, goats, rabbits and lizards. The zoo is just a 10-minute drive from the town center.

Beth Chatto's Plants and Gardens comprise 5 acres of perfectly tended native and exotic plants and flowers organized in various themed garden neighborhoods. These neighborhoods include a gravel garden, long shaded walk, scree garden, water garden and woodland garden. Each is like walking through a separate world of wonder.

The gardens were first informally planted by the famed gardener on a 5-acre plot adjacent to her home in 1960. Today, they're a major attraction that includes a nursery where you can see plants being tended and a tea room where you can relax at the end of the afternoon. They can be reached with a 15-minute drive east of the town center.

Castle Park is a Victorian park built on Roman foundations and offers a boating lake, miniature golf, a bandstand and a play park. The park draws over a million people every year to see the chunk of the Roman wall that divides the Upper Park and Lower Park, and even today maintains its Victorian charm and design.

In the summer, events are held every weekend, such as live concerts by major international acts, an annual Food and Beverage Festival, a Medieval Festival and Oyster Fayre and even outdoor movie screenings. The park is just 8 minutes away from the town center.

Cudmore Grove Country Park offers hiking and cycling trails, a sandy beach and a playground, all situated among the ruins of a fort dating to the 16th century. This park is an ideal spot for relaxation or outdoor adventuring and allows you to both visit exciting and interesting historic locations and to catch sight of a wide range of local wildlife.

You can find pillboxes and gun emplacements dated to World War II here, as well as a blockhouse dating to the 16th century and a cliffside from which hundreds of thousands of fossils have been drawn. The park can be found on the eastern end of Colchester's Mersea Island.

Colchester Castle is the largest remaining original Norman castle keep in Europe and houses a museum with exhibits from the Roman era through today, including the famous Fenwick Treasure. The keep is nearly 1.5 times the size of the White Tower in London and is built atop the foundation of a Roman Temple of Claudius.

Guided tours allow you to explore its vast vaults. Inside, you can view the Roman Colchester Vase, the Colchester Mercury statuette and Roman-era mosaics. You can also explore hands-on exhibits like excavating a Roman grave, steering a chariot and building a Norman arch. The castle is in the heart of Colchester, just an 8-minute drive from the town center.

Historic Colchester Town Hall is popular as a venue for events and weddings, but history buffs come to view the stained glass, oil paintings, murals and architecture in the rooms. Originally built around 1160, the building was renovated in the late Victorian era with opulent rooms, stunning architecture and a Victorian tower standing at 49 meters.

Guided tours are available to see the facilities. Colchester Town Hall is located right in the heart of Colchester town center, so it's easy to access.

Marks Hall Estate offers landscaped gardens with geographical themes, lakes, an arboretum with woodland hiking trails and a play area for the kids. This heritage landscape covers over just under a half-hectare of land in the Essex countryside with rare trees from all over the world, serene forest lakes and a walled garden with one of the longest herbaceous borders in the entire country.

On site, the Orchard Kitchen cafe serves light refreshments and full meals, and the gift shop lets you find the perfect souvenir. The estate is roughly a 20-minute drive west of the Colchester town center.

The Munnings Art Museum features hundreds of paintings and other works by Sir Alfred Munnings, one of England's most famed equestrian painters. The paintings on exhibit rotate every year, with 150 new ones placed on display.

Munnings lived at the Castle House where the museum is located for 4 decades. The paintings showcase the dynamic scenes of racing for which Munnings is noted, and visitors wonder at the sheer realism and composition they offer. It's only 20 minutes from Colchester town center.

High Woods Country Park is a Green Flag park that offers a stretch of hiking and cycling through scrub, woodland and meadows, as well as relaxation around clear lakes. The park is just a half-mile from the Colchester train station in the heart of the town, and it's located on the lands that once were part of the medieval forest of Kingswood.

The park features entire groves of sweet chestnut trees, and the lake is popular with anglers looking to catch carp, tench, gudgeon and other stocked fish. The visitors center has a cafe with plenty of picnic tables to sit down and enjoy a meal.