WANT to make some memories with your children? These attractions will help, but unfortunately the memories will be completely traumatic.
The London Dungeon
For adults, this is a slightly tedious traipse past unconvincing scenes of the Great Fire of London and drama students covered in blood pretending to be Jack the Ripper. To your child, it’s a terrifyingly convincing nightmare that will haunt them for years to come. And it cost you £120.
The Pitt Rivers Museum
This will be an educational and entertaining day out, you think as you stroll through the door with your family. Ten minutes later the children are crying with fear after seeing a medieval torture device, a foetus in a jar and a selection of trepanned skulls, and begging to be taken home again.
Madame Tussauds
While you find the waxworks mildly amusing, your kid is confused and disturbed by the way they sort-of-but-not-quite look like celebrities. And after they’ve seen the diorama of someone being garroted in the Chamber of Horrors, they have nightmares and insist on sleeping in your bed for the next six months.
The Smiler, Alton Towers
Your partner thinks your child is a bit too young for The Smiler, but they’re tall enough, so what’s the problem? Three minutes and 14 loops later they return having pissed themselves, which was partly because of the ride, and partly because you thought it was a good idea to tell them about the time the rollercoaster crashed five seconds before it started.
Kelvedon Hatch nuclear bunker
For you this is mainly an entertaining trip down memory lane, as you laugh at all the 80s furnishings and equipment. But for your impressionable child the experience leads to a frightening realisation that the world is phenomenally unsafe and threatening, giving them an anxiety disorder which dogs them for the rest of their life. Nice one.
