If you’re adventurious, an animal lover, and have children, you’re going to love the Lazy 5 Ranch! Heck, even if you don’t have children, you might love it! This long-time North Carolina animal attraction gives you a chance to experience a huge array of hoofed animals, feathered birds, and more up close from the comfort of your vehicle.
A lot of North Carolina natives who live in this area have visited the Lazy 5 Ranch on a grade school trip but it may be even better if you haven’t and get to experience it as an adult for the first time! This zoo is located in a quiet patch of farmland just north of Charlotte and on your way to Greensboro for an easy visit. Pulling up to the ranch you’ll find a little ticket booth up front where you pay your admission and grab some feed buckets. Admission is $15 for adults, $11 for children and seniors, if you want to do a self-guided tour. The guided wagon tour is a bit more at $21 and $15, feed buckets are $3 each and I’d recommend 1 or 2 feed buckets per person.
Just past the ticket booth is a shelter/picnic area for group outings along with the restrooms. But if you’re ready to go explore, just pull your vehicle forward to the entrance gate where you’re likely to find a queue of vehicles waiting to enter. The route around the Lazy 5 Ranch is 3.5 miles long with over 700 animals so be prepared for some fun!
Some general rules for your Lazy 5 Ranch adventures: only feed the animals the approved pellets, feed the 2-legged animals from the bucket and the 4-legged creatures from the palm of your hand! Don’t get out of your vehicle and if you want to hang out in one spot for a bit, pull over to the side. The road/path around the Lazy 5 Ranch is pretty rutted and bumpy so I would also not recommend any vehicles with lower clearances (lowered). The speed limit is 5 mph around the park so take it slow! At some points and times, the animals will crowd around your car making you slow down.
I’ve found that right at the entrance gate you’ll find some of the hungrier and more aggressive animals. A big ol Brahma bull was able to yank the entire bucket from my hand and started chowing down on it despite my attempts to fight him/her off. But these bulls are over 1,500 lbs. and strong so you won’t stand a chance, oh well! So if you feed out of your bucket, make sure you’ve got a good grip on it.
In your tour of the Lazy 5 Ranch you’ll find a plethora of beautiful animals: cows, goats, emus, pigs, zebras, deer, and much more! Some of the animals will be demure and polite, others will jam their heads into your vehicle and dive right in. There will be plenty of laughs, saliva, messiness, and fun for all! It’s hard not to have fun when a huge horned head sticks it’s head through your window looking for lunch.
Some of my favorite Lazy 5 critters are the water buffalo and emus. Both are super curious and who can resist a nose like that? The emus are pretty aggressive and will peck away at your bucket if you allow it to. As you wind your way around the ranch at the very end, you’ll come across a large giraffe pen where they keep 5 or 6 of these long-necked beauties, but they are sort of hard to feed from a vehicle given their height!
Once you have completed the loop, you can finish off at the Lazy 5 Ranch petting zoo where they have camels, kangaroos, llamas, and sheep, woo-hoo! And of course before you go home, I’d definitely recommend washing up (or make sure you bring some hand sanitizer) for sanitary reasons.
All I can say is that a visit to the Lazy 5 Ranch is a blast. It’s been months since my last trip to the Lazy 5 Ranch and I’m still picking up feed pellets from the interior of my car. But despite all the dirt and grime, the Lazy 5 ranch is worth the time and effort to visit.
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