Nerdy Travels: The Natural History Museum

This was sadly our final day before we had to head back home that evening. Although it is always sad to have to check out of the hotel and go on your way for the day until the time for the journey home arrives, we made most of the day and headed out to visit the Natural History museum. I have visited this museum multiple times over the years but museum just never get old, especially ones with cool dinosaur stuff.

The Natural History museum is a pretty easy tourist attraction to get to in London. Sitting close-by to other museums such as the V&A, the Natural History Museum is located at South Kensington and there is even an underground tunnel which takes you from the underground station to the museum entrance. The actual building is stunning to look at and I love all the beautiful architecture that London has.

The museum has a range of regular exhibits which you can visit including areas on dinosaurs, animals and minerals. There is even a small vault which is filled with amazing (and mega expensive) gemstones. This time around the museum had a special exhibit on the moon. Whilst the room (the moon room?) didn’t have a massive amount to look at or read about, the moon room did have a giant moon in it. Through the use of photography the curators had basically pieced together a whole 3D model of the moon which hung within the centre of the room. It was really pretty and soothing to just sit and admire for a while (especially after all the walking we had been doing that weekend).

We then headed for the dinosaur exhibit which is a regular exhibit displayed at the museum and no matter how many times I visit it, I always find it fascinating as it is packed with information, bones and even a couple of animatronics of dinosaurs including a T-Rex.

The vault room was the next area I wanted to visit. The museum has a massive room filled with cabinets filled with rocks and minerals all grouped together by categories. It is pretty insane just how many rocks and minerals there actually are on this planet. The vault which is located towards the end of the giant room of cabinets is filled with much more polished gemstones and unique geode structures. The vault also included a smudge in a bottle which is claimed to be the oldest thing I will ever see. So, some mind blowing stuff then.

After we’d finished up in the vault we headed down towards one of the cafes the museum has to offer. Surprisingly, the museum has multiple cafes and restaurants to choose from which are dotted throughout the building. I grabbed a delicious carrot cake and iced coffee in there and just people watched for a bit. We also wandered past the giant sloth display alongside some displays of fossils of various large aquatic life.

The final stop on our Natural History Museum antics was the Human Evolution exhibit. I’m a big believer in human evolution and find the idea of it truly fascinating and this exhibit just further fuelled my interest in it. The exhibit had a range of skulls, skeletons and reconstructions of the various humanoid life forms which have lived previously to us. It was incredible to see how many different different shapes and sizes the skeletons ranged from.