I won a medal!

I had the most productive of days in Birmingham, as I visited the Sea Life centre, I've visited the one in Brighton, and the one in London too but they were a while ago, I can't really even remember them!
We had a lovely time, our time slot was 3pm but we could stay there as long as we wanted, and see the exhibition again and again if we wanted but once was good enough for us! All in all it took us about 2 hours to get around and afterwards I felt thoroughly chilled out and relaxed. Throughout you scratch off the answers to a little quiz and if you get all 9 answers right, you get a medal! You best believe we won a medal!

Forget Olympic medals... Being a SeaLife factfinder is where it is at!

I had this idea that I think all aquariums should do, or maybe they already do- but it would be an Adults 'chill out' evening, and the aquarium would be open late maybe like 8pm-midnight and all the lighting would be dim, and there would be chill out instrumental music playing the whole time, and you'd just watch the theraputic-ness of the swimming fish and leave feeling like you just had all your troubles wash away. I think that would really work, and maybe especially beneficial to people that maybe have trouble sleeping because I think you'd sleep like a baby after that dreamy experience!

Anywho, onto the actual day and exhibitons..!

There were oodles of beautiful fish and nowhere was too crowded even though it was a weekend so you could get up close and personal with every single exhibition and maybe have better luck with your pictures than I did!...

One of the things that made it so much more fun than just fishes in tanks was the effort put into the whole decor of the place, you really felt like you were underwater even as you were walking around because of seaweed and beautiful wall art as you walked around, this extended into the tanks that made it feel like you were looking at the fishies in their natural habitat (although perhaps it doesn't feel that way to them..)

The seahorses were really fun to look at as they moved a lot as a whole, although their was this one funny exception that appeared to be clinging onto a plant in the tank for dear life and it really made me laugh! I wondered if maybe he was sleeping? Relaxing? or just poking around in the gravel for dinner..

I took a special liking to this starfish as it reminded me of Peach from Finding Nemo!

 I thought this just looked so squishy, and I wanted to touch and squish the yellow stuff (I am speaking sooo technically right now..)

 These little jelly fishes looked like tiny sweeties that would taste of strawberry ice cream! They also looked a whole lot like Dory's pet 'Squishy' from Finding Nemo... man I love that film, it's like the film was based off this very aquarium- haha!

 This mischevious and cute looking turtle awaited us after watching a turtle film in 4D its like 3D only scarier because they shoot water at you, blow wind in your face, shake the seats while it feels like everything on the screen is flying towards you, the film was for kiddies but I was super scaredy myself

You finish in the finale part which is the water tunnel, I tried to take a snap of the Hammerhead Shark but he did not want to be snapped! Oh well I tried... the mermaid statue however stayed perfectly still for me to take a pretty picture!

And finally, one of my favourite little fishy was this one, I didn't catch the name of it but it had the colour of a rainbow on it and I thought that was so pretty and so magical that their colours were natural, it's too bad that we don't have blue and pink hair that just 'naturally' grows from our heads!

I hope this made you feel as calm as it did me! You could magnify the experience by reading this blog post again and listening to Whale music in the background, or 'Sounds of the Sea' haha!

Visiting Cadbury World!

Today sempt like the perfect day to visit Cadbury World which was just nearby where I was staying, we booked a time slot online for 11:40am but due to a whole host of reasons we showed up about an hour late but the kind people at the desk acted like it was no problem that we missed our time slot and let us go through straight away anyway because it is a self guided tour! So my top tip is book over the phone and if you're late- it probably doesnt even matter!
On the walk to the Cadbury World you have to walk past the factories and the scent of melted chocolate gets your mouth salivating which is convenient as the first sight when you walk in is a HUGE Cadbury sweet shop!

Here's a little looky at what was inside...

Here's where you start, in a walk-through museum jungle where you learn a little bit about cocoa beans and where they came from

The educational stuff is then broken up by a little trip in a car at giant story books and cute cocoa beans dancing and fishing...

Then there's a few other educational-type bits before you finish up in the 'Advertising Avenue' where you see how Cadbury advertising has dated and changed

Then you're faced with displays of lots of fun things made out of chocolate like the Olympic stadium and a chocolate crown!

It was a combination of museumy type things, lots of education via videos, lots of walking, reading, and smelling chocolate and watching machinary in action.
There's lots of different 'zones' where you look at the advertising part of Cadbury, the manufacturing, the packagaing etc

As for free stuff- everyone each got 1 Crunchie Bar, 1 Dairy Milk, 1 Curly Wurly, 1 mini pot of melted chocolate, 1 bigger (egg cup sized) of melted chocoalte with other bits mixed in like marshmallows or biscuit pieces.

The best part was... the ride! It's a little like 'it's a small word' from Disneyland

Despite the fact that it is marketed so heavily at children I think is a little bit misleading, so here I'll give you some of the practical stuff that means I'm glad I didn't go until I was well above and beyond the so-called 'target age'

Alexia's Practical Cadbury World tips:
-We luckily brought with us a few bottles of water which was a relief as with all the chocolate and walking you do get really thirsty, and they strategically place drinks machines everywhere- at hefty prices, over £1 for 500ml of water which will get expensive if you're in a group!

-There is a lot of walking involved, if kids are still in pram age bring them, if not be prepared for potentially weary kids, there were times where you are sent to walk this way and that with really nothing to look at except for modern Cadbury advertisment posters on the walls, I can only presume this is to somehow 'ease' the queues to send the visitors on a bit of a wild goose chase which is fine if you're two adults who can chit-chat the whole time, not so fun for kids with little legs

-Everywhere is busy, we went before school summer holidays even began and you still end up with about 40/50 other people at any one time which means lots of queing which is why they like to stick in lots of educational videos to stagger the amount of people nice and evenly (doesn't always work though)

-The Cadbury gift shop sells some exclusive Cadbury World stuff but the sweeties that you can buy in regular shops are the same price as a supermarket, there is a small 'factory outlet' part where you can buy stuff a little cheaper if you buy it in bulk (I don't even think you need a ticket to go in the gift shop)

-The illusion is that you'll be stepping into some sort of 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' replica- this is not true, there is no flowing chocolate rivers but actually it's rather industrial and much of the educational content seems very 'school trip-ish' and somewhat old school kids at that, maybe 10 years or older to fully understand and enjoy it.

-Keep in mind it is more museum than 'candy land'

We had done our homework beforehand and so I loved every minute of it and I did know what to expect, but I was very aware of lots of kids and adults around us that were maybe even a little dissapointed by what they were experiencing, so hopefully reading this stops that dissapointment for you too!

I left without even eating my free chocolate and couldn't finish the last chocolate pot, and the sweet chocolate scent that had led us to the entrance was making me feel nauseated on the way out.

Let me know if you visited, and what your experience was. Were you dissapointed? Or had you read up beforehand and had a good grasp of what it would be like?