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side·track (sīd´trăk): n. 1. A diversion from the main course. 2. A detour taken with children that you would never, ever take without them.
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Who:
Our family of 4; one child who is a rabid Roald Dahl fan, one child who’s never read a word the guy has written, and two parents who can never decide whether Dahl’s works are brilliant children’s books or the stuff of which great nightmares are made.

What and Where:
The Roald Dahl Museum and Story Centre in Buckinghamshire, England, a tiny little place which pays homage to all things Dahl.

Why:
“Not taking a child who loves Roald Dahl books as much as your daughter does to this museum would almost be a form of child abuse,” the friend who told me about this museum insisted emphatically. (It later came out that she’s never actually ever bothered to take her own kids there. ‘Nuff said.)

The Low Point:
The doors into one of the museum’s main galleries are not only designed to look like a giant Willy Wonka chocolate bar; through the magic of molded plastic technology, they actually smell like a chocolate bar. I shudder to think how many children’s tongues had already touched those doors before my son added his own germs to the mix. Ick.

The Kid’s Take:
Our daughter was fascinated by many of the museum’s exhibits. She loved reading Dahl’s alternate story endings in one interactive section and she could have spent all day creating her own magnetic poetry masterpieces in another. That all went over her younger brother’s head, but both kids found sitting in Dahl’s writing chair and dressing up as characters from his books to be great fun. The art room scored two rave reviews as well.

The Bottom Line:
Would I choose to come here on a beautiful sunny day? Probably not. But beautiful sunny days are few and far between in England, and this turned out to be a lovely place to while away a rainy Sunday afternoon.

Some of the museum’s exhibits are a bit bizarre (there’s a lot of technology for technology’s sake, not all of which necessarily adds much to the overall museum experience), and those chocolate doors are just not sanitary. But if you’ve got some Dahl fans in the family, this little place offers a whizz popper of a day out. (Didn’t get that reference? Yeah, you could probably skip this one.)

December 9th, 2008 | by Rebecca Tompkins 3 comments