Walking With Dinosaurs - Odyssey Arena

Photo Courtesy of Neil Carey

I’m using no hyperbole whatsoever when I tell you that “Walking With Dinosaurs” was the best thing that I’ve ever seen with my eyes, ever. No exaggeration. As a self confessed nerd and lover of all things dinosaur, what could be better than a live arena spectacular involving my favourite dino pals?!

Before going to see the show at the Odyssey Arena in Belfast, I intentionally tried to avoid all adverts, pictures and information about it, to be honest I really didn't want to ruin the surprise. From what little I had heard though, I knew that I wanted to wait until I saw the real thing as it would be seriously impressive.

Upon entering the arena, we quickly found our seats and were greeted by the sight of a giant dinosaur's jaws, two screens and what appeared to be mountains in the middle. The lights were low and the atmosphere was high as thousands of kids and adults chattered in anticipation. To my surprise there were a lot of adults there without children - this just goes to show that people of all ages can enjoy what the show has to offer.

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Photo Courtesy of Neil Carey

From the moment the first dinosaur appeared on stage, the crowd went quiet as each and every one of us was transported back 248 millions years. Through the clever use of technology and props, it was hard not to be.

Throughout the course of the night the simple set was transformed as we progressed from baron landscapes, to the first signs of plant life, to raging fires and finally to the evolution of flowers and insects as we got closer to the present day. This was all demonstrated through the extremely clever use of what can only be described as blow up plants and trees which could be depressed at a moments notice - meaning that plants and trees could sprout and flourish as if from the ground itself.

As renowned palaeontologist Huxley lead us through the Cretaceous, Jurassic and Triassic periods, we were introduced to a whole host of dinosaurs, each of which helped to tell the story of both the world's and the dinosaur's evolution. (Read about the progression of the show here). It really was an educational show.

Photo Courtesy of Neil Carey

We saw 20 life sized dinosaurs roaming through the Odyssey in this £10 million arena spectacular - we saw them fight, feed, protect their young and even fly.

I think what made these dinosaurs so truly spectacular was that they were ultimately controlled by people - the smaller dinosaurs were pretty much people walking around in dinosaur costumes as they used the actors' real legs to walk around, whereas the bigger dinosaurs were mounted on what looked like small vehicles which people 'drove' around (although it does take a team of three people to operate each dinosaur). It's hard to picture just what this looks like, so it's best to look at the pictures and videos to get a true feel of what this looked like! Nevertheless this made the dinosaur's movements natural and realistic, especially when coupled with their rippling skin and glinting eyes.

I would urge anyone to go and see these dinosaurs as they will probably be as close as you're ever going to get to seeing them in real life. A truly spectacular and at times scarily realistic night. 

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By Laura Caldwell

Exploris - The Northern Ireland Aquarium

Exploris in Portaferry is Northern Ireland's only aquarium. It's one of a kind and was opened as 'The Northern Ireland Aquarium' in 1987 and then later re-opened by Prince Charles in 1994 as Exploris. Personally, when I think of aquariums I think of cold, blue spaces that smell of fish and damp...so when it was suggested that I go to Exploris for my twentieth birthday I wasn't too sure. However, I'm a sucker for nature and, quite frankly, the idea of doing something that denied my new found adult status was quite appealing. 

From the moment we walked through the doors my opinion was changed and I even felt a bit guilty for doubting the aquarium's ability to entertain, inform and amuse. One of the main reasons that I wanted to go to Exploris was my nine month old nephew, who, although maybe a little young to glean any actual educational information from our visit, clapped and gurgled his way around, appreciating the colours, sounds and textures. 

We allowed 2 hours for fun at the aquarium, so arrived around 3pm, two hours before the closing time of 5pm (the website says to allow around an hour, but two hours was plenty of time to leisurely take in all the sights and even take in a visit to the gift shop). 

Opening hours and prices look like this:

At 3.30pm we saw divers feeding the fish and they interacted with the children looking through the thick glass, waving, motioning and demonstrating how the fish and other sea creatures lived and fed.

Then, we were just in time to catch another demonstration at one of the discovery pools. This was the most enjoyable aspect of the day, the demonstration was very informative and humorous and it's always fun to be able to interact with the creatures first hand.

A very knowledgable guide showed us starfish, sea urchin, scallops, Thornback ray fish, flat fish and a small shark species called a dogfish. We were shown each species and some, such as the starfish were passed around the group as we were told about their feeding habits and some interesting facts about how they live. We were also allowed to touch the species in the pool and everyone thoroughly enjoyed this aspect of the discovery pools as there's something extremely satisfying about actually being able to interact with the seal life.

       

As soon as this demonstration was over, it was time for the seals to be fed outside in the seal sanctuary. As the feeder was feeding the seals in the pool, she told us a little about the sanctuary itself and answered all of our questions about seals and life in the sanctuary. 

There are also six hospital pools for injured or orphaned seals to inhabit until they get better. Here's a list of this season's rescues. There's also a 'seal cam' where you can view the seals (if you go on about 4pm, you can see the seals being fed!).

At the time we went there was the topical:

 Ocean Olympians Exhibition

30th June - 3rd September 2012

Meet the medal hopefuls of the marine world, from the sprint to the high jump and synchronized swimming to heavyweight boxing. Let the Games commence! 

Although we went after the 3rd September, the exhibition was still there, with lots of fun facts and comparisons between sealife and real-life Olympians.

Overall, Exploris is a well-run, extremely interesting experience that I thoroughly enjoyed and I'd recommend it to anyone who has a few hours to spend, especially parents of young children. There's even the Tides Cafe for when you're peckish which is open from 10.30am - 5.30pm in the Summer and 11.00am - 4pm in the Winter.

 By Laura Caldwell

The week we had no reviews!

Well, it finally happened. This week we didn't go and see anything and as such we're having a wee break from reviews! So we leave you with 2 things.
Firstly, we noticed that PastieBap favourites Wyldling have debuted a new video. So since they're the current holders of our most viewed post ever we thought we'd stick it up for you to have a butchers at. It's a rocking good tune with some great screming from Jilly. We're liking this harder edge!

Secondly we've been working on transferring the site over from Blogger to Weebly and thought we'd give you guys a wee look so you can give us some feed back.  The main problem with Blogger is that its terrible with handling pictures, which are a very important part of Pastiebap.com. Also we're liking the fact that this is more like a website and less like just a blog. Anyway have a wee look and let us know what you think.  We've still to update graphics, etc so please consider it a work in progress;)