Dippy And The Dinosaurs

March 2016 - Dippy the Dinosaur left the Natural History Museum in London for his UK tour. The first stop was Dorchester- county town of Dorset. And the week he arrived, I dragged Bob, on his Day Off, to the Museum to see him. We had a great time. There were eight venues on the tour, ending in Norwich Cathedral. I think that was meant to be Christmas 2020. I'd said to Bob we should see him again ... but the end of the tour was delayed by the pandemic, and Dippy has only just arrived in Norfolk.

Break, the Norfolk Youth Charity had been working on another GoGo trail - and posters went up last year saying it was postponed but not extinct!

Bob and I took Liz, Rosie and Jess into Norwich [fortunately the weather was warm and sunny] We saw half the dinosaurs on the trail

There were lots of families around, and often we had to queue for our turn to get a picture. Sometimes I wasn't able to get the info triangle [but details are all here anyway]

We got to the Cathedral just after 3pm - which is when we discovered they daily show stops at 4pm - and the queue is closed at 3.30. So we were among the last cohort for the day. The Dippy Volunteers were cheerful and helpful.

The queue was well managed, we walked round the cloisters past various informative displays. Here's Ro in the "Time Tunnel" which was illustrated with pictures from Norfolk schoolchildren.

Then there was a Wave to walk through - hundreds of beautiful metal fish - but rubbish on the ground, showing our ambivalent attitude to the oceans. The last few fish were outlines - the Christian ΙΧΘΥΣ symbol - showing that Christians believe we have a responsibility to be good stewards of God's Creation.

The ladies of WI groups in Norfolk had stitched, crocheted and knitted hundreds of green hearts to symbolise Love For Creation. Rosie was given one to pin on her tee-shirt. She made friends with the little girl who was queuing in front of us. By the end of the tour, they were chatting happily and holding hands

The tree had the words of Revelation 22 on the trunk "the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations" children were invited to add a leaf showing what actions they could take to help the planet- Rosie's said "Help the animals", and her friend's said "Save the world"

Finally we got into the nave and saw Dippy - as I'd told Rosie "He is bigger than a London Bus" It proved very hard to get a photo of whole dinosaur - there were lots of people milling about.

I solved the problem in the end by taking the shot diagonally! 

It was a brilliant day out - I hope we can get back and do the rest of the trail sometime. 

Break have said that the dinosaurs will be back next year - with some mammoths joining the T Rex models.

I think that's really good - there are folk who're still anxious about being out and about. But if you do feel able to go, I think it is a great day out!

I did my bit for the planet just before we walked up to the Cathedral-  I took a bag of used blister packs from our daily meds, and dropped them off at Norwich Superdrug - they will be recycled, and the money raised will go to Macmillan Cancer Nurses.