Dinosaurland Fossil Museum — Attraction in Lyme Regis

I’ll be honest, I’m not usually a big lover of museums with kids. It’s a little hard to get interested in stuff when you’re mostly unable to read anything - I struggle to trust some of our kids in a shop let alone a museum.

But they seemed to enjoy it enough. If you love rocks and things that look like rocks, then you’ll love it here. I think they’re called minerals, but I’m not a geologist.

There’s a massive Baryonyx, and a few other dinosaurs when you get into the main room. There is a one way system in place which is kinda needed given the size, but it did make upstairs a little more annoying.

I don’t want to moan, but there were some people up in front that seemed to want to read every single detail about the dinosaurs. I don’t blame them, they paid to get in as much as everyone else so they’re totally entitled to it. But we felt a little trapped and like we were just queuing to do something 😂

There wasn’t really much room for anyone to pass, so everyone seemed to linger about. In all honesty, if it’s a little busy and you hate confined spaces then you won’t enjoy a lot of this.

We paid £17 for two adults and one child over 5 - the other two were free - so it wasn’t a horrendous price given prices for anything these days. But it’s certainly a “one and done” kind of attraction. Just kinda something to do cause you’re in the area, vs “oh we have to travel for this.”

You can clearly see that the owner has a proper passion for this and if you share that passion then you’ll likely love it here and easily spend 1-2 hours getting absorbed in it all. It’s just not...

Small, privately-owned museum in an interesting building (former chapel) densely packed with some superb fossils and minerals all presented in a straightforward way with interesting information. The owner's enthusiasm and personality is evident throughout, with principles and ideas related to geology / paleontology / evolution frequently explained by way of personal anecdotes (field samples from experiences as a petroleum geologist, his attempts at making paleolothic tools ...). I've always liked this museum and have been here loads of times - as a child and, now, with my own children who always ask to go back whenever we visit Lyme Regis. Does have some nice details aimed at children, but is definitely built on the assumption that, if you visit / if your parents take you to a museum about fossils, then you probably do actually want to look at and find out about ... fossils! Treats visitors with respect, focuses on the real specimens, rather than sidelining them in favour of models / visualisations and doesn't pander to the trend of trying to make everything arbitrarily interactive. This approach pays some dividends, at least with my children (5 and 8), who'll happily spend 60-90 minutes here, walking around, looking carefully and asking questions, in a way they're much less inclined to do at the really big, modern museums (NHM, Science etc.), where our visits can sometimes feel more rushed and...

This place is amazing.

The only slight awkwardness is it's so packed with excellent things that it can be difficult to find passing places to let other people through while being fascinated by an endless array of ammonites :-).

While it's called dinosaurland and there are indeed an excellent array of dinosaur models, plus a whole upstairs gallery of dioramas covering the entire vaguely dinosaur related period of history, there is so much more to see here.

A fantasic collection of minerals from all over the world, some serious plesiosauria from the surrounding area complete with travelogues of how they were acquired and preserved, and many excellent fossil displays in glorious profusion, including not only beautiful iridescent ammonites but also some extremely impressive cordaites and everything else you might expect to find on the local coastline, all profusely documented with their origins in an entertaining and readable fashion.

Plus a bonus section of taxidermy of post...