Questions we're asked most

We're at 6127 Southeast 122nd Boulevard, Webster, FL 33597 — about an hour from Orlando and Tampa, and just outside The Villages.

Your booking confirmation includes a map link. There's parking on site, though we aren't able to accommodate overnight stays in the parking area.

Our experiences range from short encounters with a single species to long, immersive private sessions:

• Interactive Group Tour — interact with and feed monkeys, lemurs and rare endangered birds while walking through the open lemur habitat.
• Lemur & Friends Interactive Private Tour — monkeys, lemurs, sloths, anteaters and critically endangered birds.
• Ultimate VIP Experience — hands-on with otters, giant anteaters, sloths, tamanduas, kangaroos and lemurs.
• Keeper for a Day — our most hands-on experience: feeding, food prep, enrichment, habitat care and animal socialization.
• Painting with Primates — paint while lemurs roam freely around you and add their own contributions.
• Wildcat & Carnivore Tour — a behind-the-scenes, semi-private tour of our rarest predators. Hand-feed genets and otters, meet African servals, and come face to face with clouded leopards, caracals and lynx. Maximum 10 guests, led by the curators who trained them.
• Mini Cows & Mini Tour — hand-feed, brush and groom the mini cows, then a guided animal tour.
• Sunrise at the Sanctuary — walk the open lemur habitat, meet the animals and help feed the mini cows.
• Penguin Experience — meet, feed and spend time with our African penguins on land.
• Penguin Swim — the Penguin Experience plus getting into the water with them.
• Otter Feeding — feed two otters alongside the handler, on dry land.
• Otter Swim Lessons — get into the pool with the trainer and the otters.
• Sloth/Anteater Experience — feed sloths and interact with sloths, anteaters, toucans and ringtail lemurs.
• Fennec Fox Encounter — step inside the enclosure for a playful, up-close interaction.
• Capybara Encounter — a close-up interaction with our capybara.

Current dates, times and pricing are on the experiences page.

We care for around 200 animals across roughly 50 species. Which animals you'll meet depends on the experience you book — the private and VIP experiences reach the widest range.

Not every animal here takes part in a public experience. Some residents aren't part of any bookable interaction. If you're hoping to meet one animal in particular, email us before booking and we'll tell you honestly whether it's possible.

Plan to arrive 15 to 20 minutes before your start time. That gives you room to check in and get to the right part of the sanctuary without rushing.

The times listed when you book are the start and end of the experience itself — a session shown as 9:30–10:00 AM runs for 30 minutes.

If you're running more than 30 minutes late we may not be able to accommodate you, so please email us as early as you can if something goes wrong on the road.

Closed-toe shoes are the main thing — much of the sanctuary is natural ground and it can be muddy. Bring water, and in the warmer months a hat, sunscreen and bug spray.

Please leave loose or dangling jewelry at home — our animals are curious and will reach for it.

For the Otter Swim or Penguin Swim, come already dressed in your swimsuit so you're ready to get in the water, and bring a towel and a change of clothes for afterwards. We don't have showers or changing rooms — the most we can offer is a hose to rinse off. Plan on changing and heading home rather than staying on for another experience while wet.

Florida heat is a fair thing to plan around. Painting with Primates is often shaded, and the Sloth/Anteater Experience has shade.

For the swims, the pools themselves are covered — the penguin pool has a metal structure over it and the otter pool has a shade cloth — but the walk to the pools and parts of the experience are in the open.

Our tours have shaded stretches, but they aren't shaded the whole way.

We don't usually cancel for rain, and most experiences carry on as scheduled through a passing shower.

If lightning or severe weather makes an experience unsafe, we'll contact you as soon as we can using the details on your booking and work out a new time. Email is the best way to reach us on the day if the forecast looks bad.

Hundreds of guests with a wide range of disabilities and mobility equipment have thoroughly enjoyed our experiences. We want to give you the facts so you can decide for yourself.

The sanctuary is a working property on natural terrain. Some paths are paved and some are not — you'll encounter dirt, mud, grass and sand. Whether a given experience works depends on the type of wheelchair or equipment, the nature of the disability, and which experience you choose, so it isn't something we can answer accurately for you from a distance.

One thing worth knowing up front: the Otter Swim and Penguin Swim both require navigating steps to get in and out of the water, so those two are the least accessible experiences we offer.

If you're hesitant, our most accessible experience is Painting with Primates. It's a good first visit: you'll get a feel for the layout of the sanctuary and be able to make an informed decision about which experience to try next.

We have a Snack Shack on site for drinks and snacks. If you're here for a full day or have a gap between two experiences, we'd suggest packing a lunch as well. There are picnic tables in the entrance area.

Plenty of guests book an experience as a gift, and we love being part of it. You're welcome to bring a cake to share afterwards and enjoy it at the picnic tables in the entrance area.

Mention the occasion when you book, or email us beforehand, so our keepers know.

Yes. Afterwards you're welcome to spend time in the gift shop and entrance area and see the animals housed there. You don't need to book anything additional for that.

Access to the rest of the sanctuary is through a booked experience, since our keepers guide every interaction.

We don't offer military or senior discounts. The price shown when you book is the price for every guest, and what you pay goes directly toward the animals' care.

We don't have a public phone line — email is how our team handles bookings, changes and questions each day, and it's the fastest way to get an answer.

If your question would be easier by phone, say so in your email along with a good time to reach you, and we'll call.

Everything is booked online at the animal experiences page, where you'll see live availability for each date. Full payment is taken at booking to hold your spot.

Experiences have small capacities and the popular ones fill up, so book as soon as you know your date. We release dates on a rolling basis — if the month you want isn't showing yet, email us and we'll let you know when it opens.

Yes, and it saves time if you complete it before you arrive. The link is in your confirmation email, or you can go straight to chasesanctuary.org/waiver. Everyone taking part needs one.

Check your spam and promotions folders first. If it isn't there, email us with the name the booking was made under and we'll resend it, or send a screenshot of your reservation if the email still won't come through.

If your confirmation shows a fulfillment status of "Awaiting Processing," that's just our internal marker. Your spot is held.

Often yes — you can add spots through the experiences page.

Every experience has a capacity limit set for the animals' sake, and once a session is full we can't add anyone, even to an existing party. Email us before you buy if you're unsure and we'll check that specific session.

Yes, and lots of guests do. Our keepers will know you have both booked and will make sure you get from one to the other.

Watch the start times, though — it's possible to book two sessions that overlap. Email us the two experiences and your date and we'll confirm the timings work before you're stuck.

Yes, but spectators still need a ticket to enter the experience area, even if they aren't getting in the water or handling the animals.

Our keepers are happy to take photos and video for you during your experience, so you won't miss out if there's nobody with you to hold the camera.

Genuinely hands-on — these aren't viewing tours. That said, every interaction happens on the animals' terms. We won't push an animal into contact it isn't offering, and on a given day one may be more sociable than another.

All animal interactions happen on the animals' terms. If an animal comes up to you and chooses to interact, you're welcome to touch it.

We will never hold or restrain an animal so that a guest can touch it — not for a photo, not for anything. Please don't chase an animal, and don't approach one that's moving away from you.

We want you to have a meaningful encounter, and the encounters that happen because the animal chose them are the meaningful ones.

Gift certificates are issued as a code you enter at checkout. They can't be applied to a booking you've already paid for, but if one arrives just after you book, email us and we can usually convert the value to gift shop credit.

If the payment page loops when you try to use a code, reply to us with the code and we'll sort the booking out from our end.

Our outreach team does send texts, including birthday gift certificate offers, to supporters who have opted in. If you'd like to be sure a particular message is ours, forward it to us and we'll confirm before you reply.

Your reservation and support are important to us. As a nonprofit sanctuary, we depend on revenue from our Animal Experiences to care for the animals here. Because availability is limited, this policy allows us time to fill openings when changes occur.

Email info@chasesanctuary.org with the name on the booking, your current date, and the date you'd like to move to. If you're more than 7 days out there's no charge — we'll check availability, move the reservation and send a new confirmation.

Within 7 days of your date we aren't able to reschedule. You can email to ask to be considered for an exception; if one is granted it carries a $25 per person reschedule fee, which becomes a donation to the sanctuary. There's no limit on how far out you can move a booking.

A few, and they're often better value than cancelling:

• Transfer it. Give the reservation to a friend or family member for the same date, at no charge. Email us and we'll change the name.
• Hold it as credit. We can keep the value on file toward a future visit.
• Swap it. We can often apply the value to a different experience the same day, or to gift shop credit.

Charges appear on your statement as "FH* Chase Sanctuary an." If a refund has been issued, it can take up to 30 days for your bank or card issuer to return the funds.

Every experience is open to guests 8 and older. Guests aged 8–13 must be accompanied by a parent or guardian; guests 14 and older may attend without one.

Guests 14 and older can take part in an interaction without a parent alongside them, but a parent or guardian must be on the premises for the duration of the visit and must sign the waiver for every minor in the party. We can't accept a waiver signed by anyone other than the parent or guardian.

Everyone attending needs their own ticket, including a parent or guardian who is only there to supervise. We keep groups small, so every person on site counts toward the group size whether or not they take part.

Yes, as long as the students meet the age requirement — all experiences are 8 and older, with an accompanying adult required for anyone under 14. Every student and every adult needs a ticket.

We've hosted classes that split into groups and rotate between activities such as Painting with Primates and a guided tour, which works well for larger classes.

Email us with your group size, the age of the students, your preferred dates and roughly what you'd like to include, and we'll put together options and per-student pricing so you can take a figure to your district or PTA.

Absolutely. We don't have a standard group rate, but we'll help you find the experience that suits your group size and budget.

Send us your numbers and the dates you're considering. If your employer needs us set up as a vendor, or has a matching or volunteer-day program, mention that too — we've worked through those before.

Yes. A corporate day with us usually combines a few things: a hands-on volunteer session, a presentation from our team about the sanctuary's conservation work, and a coordinated lunch on site. We'll shape the day around what your group wants out of it.

Email us with your company, the size of the group and the dates you're considering, and we'll work out what's possible.

If individuals on your team want to keep coming back afterwards, our volunteer program is open to anyone 16 and older.

The most impactful way to give is our round-up program — your everyday purchases round up to the nearest dollar and the difference comes to the animals. It's small enough not to notice and steady enough that we can plan around it. You can set that up, along with any recurring donation, at chasesanctuary.org/donate.

For a one-time gift you have three options:

• chasesanctuary.org/donate
• chasesanctuary.org/paypal
• A check mailed to us at 6127 SE 122nd Blvd, Webster, FL 33597

Both run through Harness, so you can manage them yourself. Create an account at chasesanctuary.org/donate using the email address you donated with, then choose Recurring to change the amount, update your payment method or cancel.

If that doesn't work for you, email info@chasesanctuary.org and we'll take care of it. No explanation needed.

One thing we can't change from our end is the email address on your account — it's part of your sign-in credentials. Email us and we'll sort it out for you.

Donation receipts are transactional and required, so those can't be switched off. Marketing emails can be stopped using the unsubscribe link in any of them, and text updates can be turned off in your donor dashboard.

Email us and we'll cancel any recurring donation and remove your stored payment details, then confirm once it's done.

Yes. We don't have a public phone number, but our team can call you. Email us a number and the best time to reach you, and we'll get in touch to answer your questions.

Chase Sanctuary is a 501(c)(3) non-profit. Donations and the proceeds from animal experiences fund daily care for the animals here, along with the conservation work that supports endangered species beyond the sanctuary.

We're often able to contribute an experience gift certificate to charity auctions and raffles, and we take part in local events. Email us with your organization, the event and the date, and our outreach team will follow up.

We do host vendors at our seasonal events. Email us with what you sell and which event you're interested in, and we'll pass it to the team organizing that date.