The Dinosaur Museum, Dorchester

This place shouldn’t really be allowed to charge money for this attraction. It’s like walking into your child’s school exhibition on dinosaurs that has become some what tatty and worn with age. We visited this attraction as a last resort for a rainy day outing and I wish we’d stayed in our tent playing snap. We went with our two pre-school children and the only pleasure they got from this place was leaving it. It’s not spacious so you’re forever having to move out of the way for other visitors. Neither is it pushchair friendly with two floors yet no lift. The toilets are cramped and there is no car parking on site. There is a yard with a large-scale crumpling dinosaur which you can take your photograph with. This is probably the best thing here. Luckily there isn’t a café on site as you wouldn’t want to waste you time in here any longer than required. It’s such a shame that this is the only dinosaur museum in the area, with a few pamphlets on fossils. Shame on you Dorest.

We went here whilst on holiday as my youngest son is dinosaur mad.We were given a fact sheet which my eldest loved filling in - although he had done this in about 5 minutes - the place is rather small. Varied facts, bones and life sized models squeezed in and a 'cinema' upstairs. The museum is dated and very small , and as adults my husband and i were not ecstatic about the price we paid verses what we got for our money.However my 3 year old LOVED it ! He still talks about it now - had i not had a child who is obsessed with dinosaurs i wouldnt be a happy bunny.

My advice - if you are the sort of person (like me) who finds humour in the strangest things then you must visit this place. You pay good money to be admitted into a museum, so comical in its inadequacy, that you will be reduced to a teary-eyed, giggling wreck by the time you leave. Useless information, unrealistic papier mache models, 80s computers, plastic dinosaur toys crudely screwed to the wall, and a curious box with a light inside to show that dinosaurs see things, well, just like us... with the aid of...er...light. If you do go then make sure you strike a rapport with the mums (trying to make light of the situation) and dads (trying to pretend it wasn't their idea to come). I'm sure this place must be some kind of local 'in' joke. Oooh, you little rotters, you.... Grrr!