Olympic Game Farm
1423 Ward Rd
Sequim, WA
A drive-through farm on the Olympic Peninsula where bears wave for bread and many of the animals, or their ancestors, once starred in Disney nature films.
Olympic Game Farm is a drive-through animal park in the farm country north of Sequim, where you tour a long loop in your own car and hand feed bison, elk, llamas, yaks, and zebras that amble right up to your window. The stars of the show are the bears, which have learned to sit up and wave a paw in exchange for a slice of bread, a trick that has made the place a Pacific Northwest road-trip legend.
What sets it apart from any ordinary petting zoo is the history behind the fences. For nearly three decades this was Walt Disney's wildlife ranch, the place that raised and trained the animal actors for a generation of Disney nature films, and many of the animals here today are the descendants or retirees of that Hollywood chapter.
What Guests Love
- Hand feeding yaks, llamas, elk, bison, and zebras right from the car window
- The famous bears that sit up and wave for a piece of bread
- The unlikely backstory as Walt Disney's wildlife ranch
- Doing the whole loop from your own car, which is easy with kids or in any weather
Worth Knowing
- It is a drive-through you tour in your own vehicle at a slow crawl; the loop can back up on busy weekends
- You buy loaves of bread at the entrance to feed the animals along the drive
- The farm has drawn criticism and repeated USDA scrutiny over its animal care over the years, so it is worth reading recent reviews and forming your own view before you go
- Sequim's rain shadow keeps it drier and sunnier than the rest of the Olympic Peninsula, but bring layers for the coast
Details
Sequim, WA
Learn about Olympic Game Farm
The Disney years
The farm began in the 1950s as a working partnership between wildlife photographer Lloyd Beebe and Walt Disney Studios. For about twenty-eight years Beebe's ranch on the Olympic Peninsula served as the holding and training ground for the animals in Disney's True-Life Adventures and its live-action nature movies, filmed both here and on location around the peninsula.
Animals connected to the ranch appeared in films and shows that families of the era knew by heart, including Charlie the Lonesome Cougar, The Incredible Journey, and the Grizzly Adams series. When the studio drifted away from nature films after Walt and Roy Disney died, the Beebes chose to keep caring for the animals themselves.
In 1972, with Disney's blessing to keep the connection public, the Beebe family opened Olympic Game Farm to visitors. The idea was to give captive-bred and in-need animals a permanent home and to let the public meet the kinds of creatures that had spent their careers in front of the camera.
The drive-through
You experience the farm from your car, rolling slowly along a loop road with a loaf of bread on the seat beside you. Herds of American bison, Roosevelt elk, Tibetan yaks, llamas, Sika deer, and zebras drift up to the windows to take a piece, and the pace is unhurried enough that kids can watch each animal up close.
The bears are the moment everyone remembers. Housed along the route, several have learned that sitting upright and waving a paw brings a reward, and the sight of a big bear waving from behind its barrier is the photo that has launched a thousand road trips. Wolves, big cats, and other rescued animals live in enclosures you view from the loop as well.
A place people argue about
The farm is genuinely beloved by generations of Northwest families, and it is also genuinely controversial. Its role as a roadside attraction where animals are fed by the carload, and the conditions some of the animals live in, have drawn criticism from animal-welfare advocates and repeated attention from federal inspectors over the years.
It is worth going in with eyes open. Some visitors come away delighted by the close encounters and the sense of history, and others leave uneasy about the setup. Reading recent reviews and reporting before you visit will help you decide whether it is the stop for you.
Sequim and the rain shadow
The game farm sits just outside Sequim, a town that sits in one of the driest corners of western Washington. The Olympic Mountains wring the rain out of Pacific storms before they reach this side, leaving Sequim in a sunny rain shadow that has made it famous for lavender farms and clear-sky days while nearby Forks drowns under record rainfall.
That mild, bright weather makes the game farm an easy any-season stop, and it pairs naturally with the other draws nearby: the long sand hook of the Dungeness Spit and its lighthouse, the summer lavender fields, and the drive up to the alpine meadows and mountain views of Hurricane Ridge in Olympic National Park.
Closest Boutels
The closest Boutel™ stays, so you can turn this stop into an overnight. Each is an independently owned, editorially selected place to stay.
Things to Do Near Sequim
Dungeness National Wildlife Refuge
About 8 miles north
The Dungeness Spit, one of the longest natural sand spits in the world, curves five miles into the strait to a historic lighthouse, with a bird-rich refuge along the way.
Sequim lavender farms
Around Sequim
Sunny fields of lavender that peak in summer and give Sequim its nickname as the lavender capital of North America, with u-pick rows and farm stands.
Hurricane Ridge
About 25 miles southwest
A mile-high viewpoint in Olympic National Park above Port Angeles, with alpine meadows, wildflowers, and a wall of glaciated Olympic peaks.