It’s no secret my family and I love animals. In fact, family and friends tease us all of the time that we could open up a petting zoo of our own, with all of the animals that we own. So it shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that one of my favorite movies of all time is We Bought a Zoo, which is pretty much my dream. The movie is based on the true story of British journalist Benjamin Mee, who bought the struggling Dartmoor Zoo in 2006 in Devon, England. He wrote a book chronicling their adventures…and then it became the classic movie starring Matt Damon and Scarlett Johansonn. No matter how many times I watch the movie, I never get bored (and not just because it stars Matt Damon).
It’s also the real-life story of Tara Campbell Lussier, who bought the NOVA Wild in 2022. Unfortunately the property came with some negative publicity. Previously known as the Reston Zoo, the zoo was sold in 2016 and rebranded as Roer’s Zoofari after several high-profile animal cruelty charges, which I won’t get into here because they are so upsetting. After a barn-fire in 2021 killed two giraffes, a petition began circulating the shut the zoo down for good. The property went up for sale with the caveat that it had to remain a zoo. Once she took ownership of the property, she renamed it Nova Wild and immediately began to make improvements around the property. It’s very apparent that she wants to distance herself from the previous owners and create a space where animals are well cared as well as focusing on education and wildlife conservation. Today the zoo is home to nearly 200 hundred animals, some of which you can pet and feed.
One day last month my daughter and I decided to make a trek up to Reston and check it out! The really cool thing about WILD Nova is that once you buy your tickets, you are free to spend as much time at the zoo as you want to at your own pace. Once you arrive you can do the drive-through safari first then the walk through or vice versa. We chose to do the walk-through first, then the safari, then the butterfly exhibit and one more walk through the park before leaving. Here’s some of the highlights of our visit:
The Petting & Walk-Throuh Zoo
After getting our wristbands and purchasing 2 buckets of food (which ended up being way too much, we really only needed one bucket to share between the two of us) at the entrance, our first stop was the barn animals. I am not sure why, as we get to pet barn animals all the time. But it was fun petting them nonetheless.
After getting our fill of the petting zoo, we then went on to walk around the more traditional zoo setting. While there aren’t a lot of animals to see, we did enjoy seeing our favorite animals like anteaters, capybaras and cheetahs.
The Red River hogs were surprisingly fun to watch and they rutted around their enclosure making the most adorable little sounds.
Wild Wings Butterfly exhibit
I love butterflies, so anywhere we go that has a butterfly exhibit I am there! The Wild Wings exhibit at NOVA Wild is essentially a giant butterfly garden, with hundreds of butterflies freely flying about. I felt like a Disney princess with all of the butterflies fluttering around me. We actually spent quite a lot of time in there just walking around and watching all of the butterflies doing there thing. One thing to note is that entrance to the butterfly exhibit is an additional $8/person.
Drive-Through Safari
Our favorite part of our trip was hopping in the car for the self-guided drive-thru safari! We drove -slowly – through the park with our windows down and food buckets ready. A lot of the animals congregate at the entrance to the safari but there are still a lot to see around the 12-acre safari. The hard part was making sure we didn’t spend too much time feeding and petting the animals and causing a traffic jam behind us! While there isn’t a large variety of animals to feed, it was a fun half hour drive. And best of all is that you can go through the safari as many times as you would like to!
Be prepared, though. The inside (and quite possibly the outside) of your car will end up messy. Especially if you are like us and let the animals stick their heads in for a visit.
Final Thoughts
Being the animal advocates that we are, we are pretty judgmental when it comes to zoos and animal welfare. And from the looks of things, it seems that NOVA Wild is heading in the right direction. We were pleasantly surprised! While it is still a work in progress (they are still renovating and improving existing habitats and there is construction going on to create new habitats as well as experiences such as glamping campsites), we were very happy to see that all of the animals are happy and seem to be receiving the care they deserve. So if you are looking for a cool place to get close to the animals…some domestic and some endangered from around the world…NOVA Wild is a great choice to spend a morning or late afternoon a few hours before closing. You can plan on spending 2-3 hours there and have a great time!
Know Before You Go
NOVA Wild is located at 1228 Hunter Mill Rd, Vienna VA 22182
- Hours: Open every day from 9:00am – 6:00pm. However, check their social medias for any unexpected closings due to special events or inclement weather.
- Price: $20 for adults, $15 for children (there are special discounts for seniors and military)
- Food Buckets: Available for $20/each
- The Wild Wings Butterfly Exhibit is $8/person
- Special Animal Encounters: If you want to get up and close with animals such as the sloths, capybaras and cheetahs, you can book a special encounter starting at $100/person.
- Private events: You can hold events like birthday parties at the zoo for an additional fee.
- Food for humans: There is no cafeteria on site but there is food trucks on site.
NOVA Wild hosts many special events throughout the year. Follow them on their Facebook and Instagram social media pages to keep up to date on all the happenings!
