My eldest is currently dinosaur mad so we have created a little getaway surprise for him over his first school two-week half term. Staying in the lovely seaside town of Lyme Regis, we know that this is a hub for fossil hunting with Charmouth nearby, ready to try your hand at fossil hunting ourselves.
We got to Lyme Regis at lunchtime so we grabbed some lunch before wondering along the promenade, to the famous Cobb. At the end of the harbour is a small marine aquarium and a fossil collection from Lyme Regis famous fossil collector Mary Anning. Although small, the aquarium is delightful as it is very interactive allowing you to hold some of the creatures, which went down really well with my eldest.
Next up was a visit to Dinosaurland Fossil Museum, which is a privately owned collection from palaeontologist husband and wife team and is the best fossil display to be found in the South West. Going to bed with pictures of dinosaurs in our heads from all the fossil examples we had seen, we get up the next day bright and early as we have booked onto. a fossil hunting walk at the Charmouth Coast Heritage Centre. The centre is free to enter and is really educational, with all sorts of example of fossils and dinosaurs found there at Charmouth. We had a talk that told us what. to look out for before being guided to a fossil hotspot on Charmouth Beach. We were very surprised that we got quite a haul from this and indeed they were confirmed as fossils, which was great! I swiftly removed from my pocket the quite frankly ridiculously big ammonite I bought from a gift shot before we went back into my handbag, so I didn't have a disappointed 6 year old.
That night Nanny babysat so my husband and I could go out for a meal, and have a date night, as it was almost my husbands birthday. We really pushed the boat out by visiting Hix Oyster and Chop House at the top of Lyme Regis, looking over the bay. We sampled the oysters of course. I was enveloped entirely by the sea!
On our final day on the way home we visited the Dinosaur Museum in Dorchester, just to get that wow factor of made up plastic dinosaurs to really thrill the kids. I thought it was small and a tad lame but the kids loved it; sometimes you just forget what it is like being 6.
