A couple of months ago I went to the London Planetarium as part of a 'two for one' Time Out splurge around London.
You can buy tickets for the Planetarium for around £7.00 or so or buy them as a joint ticket with the Madame Toussards Exhibition next door. This works out a bit cheaper but ... Read review
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Advantages: a great show somewhere in the middle Disadvantages: so expensive it hurts
...ago I went to the London Planetarium as part of a 'two for one' Time Out splurge around London.
You can buy tickets for the Planetarium for around £7.00 or so or buy them as a joint ticket with the Madame Toussards Exhibition next door. This works out a bit cheaper but you still need to remember to remortgage your house before setting out.
At half price, the family ticket for both was still around £30 - if you see ... ...Having cost around a third of the joint ticket price, I was not expecting hours of fun but perhaps just two hours, maybe.
The entrance lobby had a few interesting gadgets and interactive displays, but I remember thinking it wasn't anything special. For this reason, I was keen to move on into the main section.
Through to the next part, there were a couple of posters and a poor attempt at some interactive displays. A ... more
A couple of months ago I went to the London Planetarium as part of a 'two for one' Time Out splurge around London.
You can buy tickets for the Planetarium for around £7.00 or so or buy them as a joint ticket with the Madame Toussards Exhibition next door. This works out a bit cheaper but you still need to remember to remortgage your house before setting out.
At half price, the family ticket for both was still around £30 - if you see what I mean.
Anyway, I digress. Having cost around a third of the joint ticket price, I was not expecting hours of fun but perhaps just two hours, maybe.
The entrance lobby had a few interesting gadgets and interactive displays, but I remember thinking it wasn't anything special. For this reason, I was keen to move on into the main section.
Through to the next part, there were a couple of posters and a poor attempt at some interactive displays. A queue indicated that this was the waiting area for a show. We sat tight waiting for the doors to open to the auditorium.
We sat in total for about 45 minutes. The children were bored to tears and so were we!
At last we were led into the show. The seats were in a semi-circle and the film was shown projected into the ceiling - an impressive dome.
The almost 3D effects were very good and the 20 minute or so film was excellent. It may have been longer but time went quickly and I didn't check my watch.
The lights came on at the end and my faith in the Planetarium was restored - after the long wait and boring displays, I had really enjoyed the brief film. I was enlightened, and quite ready to explore the rest of the attraction.
The exit from the auditorium led us to the next room...
THE SOUVENIR SHOP!
Yes, that's right there was nothing more to see!
I was quite amazed. We had got the tickets at half price and slightly reduced for buying in conjunction with Madame Toussards, but it was still a huge rip off! Imagine if we'd paid full price for the Planetarium alone - it's certainly not a full day out!
My advice is leave well alone. If you have to go - wait for an offer and make sure you've got more things planned for that day - or you'll be sorely dissapointed!
Advantages: informative, fun, fantastic audio-visual experience Disadvantages: crowded, bit expensive
If you've read my opinion on Madame Tussauds, you will know that I visited the Planetarium in part to avoid the long queue to get into Madame Tussauds, as the Planetarium is part of the Tussauds group, and located next door to Madame T's, with a connecting door between the two - thus once you're inside the Planetarium you bypass the queue to get into Madame T's. Nearest tube station to the Planetarium is Baker Street.
Unfortunately it is a little ... ...and a combined ticket to both Madame T's and the Planetarium is £13.95. I think the combined ticket is the best option, as it is only a couple of pounds more than the regular admission price just to Madame T's.
Personally, I found the Planetarium to be much more interesting. Even though I am not a science fan at all, I still enjoyed it, which is saying something, as normally I will avoid anything scientific like the plague! You start off by going ...
weebagpuss 15.03.2001
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of London Planetarium, London
Advantages: See opinion Disadvantages: See opinion
...when I found myself in London in February, 2000, for the first time in many years, a visit to the famous Planetarium at Madame Tussauds was very high on my list of things to do.
We went as a family, myself and my wife, and our nine year old daughter, (actually she was eight then!) and enjoyed the experience immensely.
We bought the combined ticket that entitles you to visit both Madame Tussauds and the Planetarium, and in fairness it wasn’t ... ...or £42 for the three of us, but was worth every penny.
Tussauds is an experience in itself, and I’ll return to that in a later opinion, but for the moment let me tell you about the wonders that await you in the Planetarium, which is the nearest most people will ever get to actual space travel.
~ ~ The highlight of the experience is off course the huge copper dome itself, where you watch the majesty of the Universe unfold in all its glory ...
the_mad_cabbie 20.03.2001
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of London Planetarium, London
...years ago I visited the London Planetarium. It was great, very informative and I really enjoyed it. In fact I enjoyed it so much I promised myself I would return one day!!! Well that 'one day' finally arrived last month when my partner and I went to visit my daughter who is a student living in London. Having 3 telescopes between us, and being astronomy cabbages we were both keen to visit and excitedly set off on the Sunday morning.
It is easy to ... ...main entrance. However, on arrival we found that there was no sign offering a way into the Planetarium so we asked a Tussauds employee at the exit how we accessed it. He told us the queue was at the other end of the building so off we trotted, dutifully joined and waited. Nowhere did we see any more employees until we got to the end of the queue some 40 minutes later and nowhere did the signage explain anything about the Planetarium. As we had asked ...
ghis 18.11.2004
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of London Planetarium, London
Advantages: no where to use your money? Disadvantages: waste of your precious time
...first impression to think that london planetarium was a nice place to go for a visit...i said to myself..oh..what the heck..just go..
i was dissapointed...it was just like what my friends told me..if i've listened to 10% of what they are saying..i won't be so foolishly wasted my money to go in there in the first place, would i?
well...the only suggestion i would make is that..if you are really interested in science and all the things in the sky.....then ...
windchimes 09.08.2000
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: somewhat helpful Review of London Planetarium, London
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