Mick had spent all morning polishing his baby - a red 1968 Triumph 2000 while his wife, Patsy, packed sausage rolls, custard creams and juice into the picnic basket. Their eldest, Koochy, was seven today, and they were going on a big adventure. Mick had heard the new Safari Park entry fee was fifteen quid. He had chewed it over for weeks, but it was his boy’s birthday after all.
Mick smiled as they hit the road and he slipped the Triumph into top gear. The car purred, its body work gleaming in the sunshine. Koochy, Rosco, and big sister, Fran, sat sardined in the back seat squabbling over a box of Bassett’s Liquorice Allsorts.
At the Park gates a man in a wooden hut was taking the money. He counted how many people were in the car and asked Mick for £20. Everyone held their breath. Patsy smiled when Mick peeled a note from his back pocket without comment.
They joined the caterpillar of cars crawling through the shimmering heat. The first field seemed empty, dotted with ancient trees, and scorched grasses from the dry summer. Fran screeched and pointed out the window. The head of a lion was poking through a patch of thistle. His eyes were amber, his tail flicking up clouds of flies.
Once through the next gate, Rosco spotted a giraffe teetering on its tiptoes, stretching its long tongue into the canopy of a chestnut tree. The Park’s zebra-striped jeep manned the perimeter, keeping an eye on activities. It was the Game Warden’s job to ensure families kept moving and stayed safe.
The children shed their cardigans as things were certainly hotting-up. Mick tapped the temperature gauge on the dashboard. The car was roasting. Not being able to open windows didn’t help. Patsy checked the map they were handed at the gate. They would eat in the sea-lion area where there were toilets and picnic tables. They could get out for a leg stretch too.
A perfect posse of gazelle crossed the track like ballet dancers, while just ahead they spotted a big beech tree festooned with baboons, mums and dads with tiny babies clinging to their backs. The adults flashed their weird, fleshy backsides at the approaching car. ‘Look at the bum on that,’ chuckled Mick. The kids giggled in the back. They sensed this was becoming a lot more fun as a trio of baboons led by a large male, swung down from the tree, and swaggered towards the Triumph.
With a bump, bump, bump, they leapt onto the bonnet. The car shook as two of them clambered onto the roof. The kids watched their father’s eyes grow wide in the mirror as the smallest baboon slithered off the roof, and down the driver’s side window to swing from the wing mirror. ‘Little $!&t!’ roared Mick, ‘I’ll sort you . . .’ and he yanked the steering wheel sharply to unseat the creature. There was a loud crack as the wing mirror fell limp. It hung like a broken arm while the baboon bounced on its knuckles onto the ground. The big fella, still on the bonnet, grabbed a windscreen wiper to steady himself and pulled it right off, throwing it into brambles at the track side.
Mick's face turned an unusual shade of pink. He bared his teeth and growled eye to eye with the pack leader. On the roof, the other baboon was now bouncing up and down using it as a trampoline. The car roof was bulging. ‘Get off ma motor now!’ Mick yelled, banging on the windscreen with his fist. The big fella cocked his head to one side and smiled. He opened his long fingers revealing a sludge of brown banana. He looked at Mick, then smeared it slowly across the windscreen. Then, with his eyes still locked on Mick’s, he opened his mouth wide, showing off massive yellow incisors, and let out a piercing victory whoop.
The kids were now a scrum of hysteria. They’d never seen their dad this angry. Not even that time when Koochy pooed his pants in the back of the old Humber Hawk.
‘THAT’S IT!’
Mick shoved the accelerator flat to the floor and swerved from side to side. The two smaller baboons abandoned ship while the big fella flattened himself across the windscreen obscuring Mick’s vision. Patsy was weeping, black mascara coursing in streaks down her cheeks. She pleaded with Mick to stop, and he did. With the car moving at 50 mph he stood hard on the brake. The big fella skidded towards the bonnet edge, claws raking the paintwork and took the second windscreen wiper with him.
‘You’ve had it now pal!’ Mick roared, as he opened the door and stepped out onto the dusty track. The big fella looked confused. He leaned on the bonnet scratching himself as if deciding his next move. The baboon troupe who had been howling encouragement from the side lines, fell silent.
‘GET BACK IN THE CAR! The Warden’s voice boomed from the megaphone atop the zebra jeep as it raced towards the car. ‘GET IN YOUR CAR. NOW!’
Mick stepped up to the bonnet inches from the big fella. Hands on his hips, feet spread wide like John Wayne off the tele. He looked around him. He surveyed the Triumph with a stunned expression on his face.
‘Ma car . . .?’ He shook his head. ‘Ma braw car.’
The kids had never seen their father cry before – Boy! was this a birthday to remember.
The Warden, rifle slung across his shoulder, pushed Mick back into the car and slammed the door. The big fella shrugged and lumbered back to his troupe beneath the trees.
Once they were escorted from the area, the Warden told them to go home as they were banned from any further visits to the Safari Park. Then with a polite smirk, he added, ‘Better drive carefully, Sir. The forecast is for rain.’