What a fantastic idea I thought, the kids will love that and how great it will be for them to see how things used to be where they lived back in the 'olden days.'
BCLM is located in Dudley and has several old buildings which have been painstakenly moved brick by brick to the museum, lots of displays, and people dressed up in victorian outfits explaining all about their life. There is even an old fashioned fairground.
Looking at the prices online it wasn't over priced, under 5's went in free, over 5's were £6.10 as were students and Adults were £12.60. They even did family tickets, 2+3 for £34 and 1+1 for £17. There was a reduction in price if you paid in advance. What was even better value was that this one off payment allowed entrance to the museum for a whole year! Absolutely fabulous.
When we got there Thomas who is 4 was really excited and was trying to see and do everything all at once. He loved looking at all the old vehicles especially the rather grand fire engine. He is very much a boy in that respect. Where as Ollie on the other hand just wanted to run around the place messing with all the displays while mummy had a nervous break down at the thought of those old relics being damaged.
The old fashioned fairground was another hit with the children although Thomas and Ollie were not tall enough to go on half the rides. I am guessing health and safety didn't exist when the fair opened way back when so kids of all ages probably went on the rides. They still managed to enjoy themselves and spend a lot of my money to boot! To be fair though the rides were around £1.00 a go which is cheap compared to some rides nowadays. Also it can't be cheap maintaining such an old fairground rides.
After building up an appetite at the funfair we all headed over to the old fashioned chip shop for a lovely bag of fish and chips. The chips were cooked in lard, yum yum. They were not cheap at £5.50 a bag and we had to wait a very long time in a very long queue to get them. The kids became very restless and Thomas especially started playing up, but as soon as the food came they instantly shut up and became quiet.
After filling our bellies we went around the old houses and Ollie preferred the gardens to the inside of the houses. It is amazing how different houses were back then. They were tiny but cosy. It is hard to imagine that a whole family would live in one room of the house and that the stove was always kept on. I wouldn't have been too fond of the washing arrangements either. I have a new found love of my washing machine. :-)
After a long informative day we were all ready to go home. It was a wonderful day and we all learnt something new. My daughter takes after me as her favourite thing was the little house which contained all the old money, shillings, sixpences, hapennies etc. The paper money looked like manopoly money!
We would all definitely go again. I would reccommend it to anyone especially if you like history.
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