Visit Dorchester for various informative Museums and take advantage of great discounts with our Great Savings Guide.
Why visit one museum in a day when you can take in four all in the same town… more, even? In fact, Dorchester – county town of Dorset with a population of some 22,000 – can surely claim to have a higher concentration of museums than any other town in the UK. Depending on boundaries, there are at least ten.
There’s no real reason why Dorchester has accumulated so many museums, but it certainly makes for a great day out.
The rather grandly titled World Heritage Museums has a portfolio that covers The Dinosaur Museum, The Tutankhamun Exhibition, Dorset Teddy Bear Museum and The Terracotta Warriors Museum. All of these museums offer a two-for-one discount through the Great Savings Guide.
It all started some 40 years ago with, somewhat appropriately, the founding of the Dinosaur Museum – a fitting location considering you can be on Dorset’s Jurassic coast within ten miles of Dorchester. When we visited, we found easy parking at the Top of O’Town multiuse car park, with a 15-minute walk to the Dinosaur Museum (you should find it easy enough to park up closer, if needed).
This is the place to be if you fancy tickling a Tyrannosaurus Rex, snuggling up to a Stegosaurus, or mingling with a Megalosaurus. Along with other life-size, realistic dinosaur reconstructions, you’ll also see plenty of real fossils, skeletons and more.
Rather uniquely, it’s officially the only museum in the country dedicated exclusively to dinosaurs. It was also among the first museums anywhere to introduce audio-visual displays – all helping to make it a great attraction for the whole family (as if kids these days need any excuse to go and find out more about dinosaurs), including the dog. Yes, you can even take your dog around here.
Photo courtesy of World Heritage
It was the shortest of walks (and even closer to our car park) to the next museum. The Tutankhamun Exhibition is housed in a church that started its life across the county in Wareham, before being transported stone-by-stone using donkey carts to be rebuilt at its current location on High Street West.
The Tutankhamun Exhibition was set up in 1986 as a successful attempt to convey what the archaeologist and Egyptologist Howard Carter saw and was dazzled by when he was the first to see the tomb of Tutankhamun and all its treasures. That was as recently as 1922, but it’s still cited as ‘the greatest archaeological discovery ever made’.
Photo courtesy of World Heritage
Head round to where Salisbury Street meets High East Street and you’ll find the Teddy Bear Museum and Terracotta Warriors Museum – two very different subject matters but they share a home in the same building.
With the proviso that “teddy bears are more than toys”, you’ll have the opportunity to get up close to favourites such as Rupert, Paddington, Winnie the Pooh and plenty more. Plus you can view all manner of antique teddies from a slightly longer distance.
Photo courtesy of World Heritage
Similarly, at the Terracotta Warriors Museum, you get the fascinating story of how and why China’s first emperor, Qin Shi Huangdi (say it Chin Shee Huang Dee), had over 8,0000 clay figures made in his name (clue: he was also responsible for the Great Wall of China).
Even our four-museum trip was enough to give you a taste of the richness of Dorchester that you will want to explore more. Don’t forget, Dorchester and its surroundings are part of Thomas Hardy Country (Wessex, as he preferred to call it) with the town providing the template for his novel, The Mayor of Casterbridge.
Dorchester is suitably inland from the Jurassic Coast and its resorts, ranging from Lyme Regis to Weymouth, Swanage, Poole, Bournemouth and more. So, if the weather isn’t so great and/or you want a break from the beaches, you know where to head.
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Please visit camc.com/greatsavingsguide for vouchers, discount codes and pre-booking where relevant, as well as terms and conditions. Please check site and attraction opening dates and times before visiting/travelling.
