They say that the UK is a nation of animal lovers and we are no exception to this rule. We love all animals, from the cute and the cuddly to the large and frankly a little scary, we like nothing more than to get up close and personal with them all. We have had many visits from some wonderful creatures and this week's visit from Andrea and her animals was no exception.

Andrea brough along quite a menagerie, from bunnies and lizards to spiders and snakes, they were magnificent although I thought that the spider was more magnificent from a distance.

Andrea is so knowledgeable about her animals and we could have listened to her all afternoon. We really enjoyed the visit, the bunny was adorable, the lizard was very entertaining, the snake was enormous and the spider, well the spider split the room.

We are very fortunate that we are able to experience so many new things here at Timken, we had all cuddled a bunny but it's not every day that you get to pet a snake