Ripley’s

Believe it or not, the last thing on Lauren’s “to-do” list for London was to visit Ripley’s. Though I’ve never had a desire to go there myself, I’d be lying if I said that I’d never been a little bit curious. And, as Kristy so rightly pointed out, this may have been my only opportunity ever to go along with someone that actually wanted to be there. As such, I seized the moment, and tagged along.

(Un)fortunately(?) for you, I didn’t have lovely camera with me, and although I did have little camera, I had it on all of the wrong settings. So, we came away with barely any photos to show for ourselves – this rather grainy shot of me sitting in a unbelievably large rocking chair is about the best that you can hope for here.

The highlight of the visit – for me at least – was the gigantic mirror maze. We should have packed a meal before entering, because we got lost so many times inside that we almost had to camp overnight. Had we have had to turn to cannibalism to survive, I reckon I could have overpowered Lauren and at least had me some tea. Then again, she’s small and nimble, and being a university student, she’s probably quite crafty too; I’ve no doubt she has some tricks up her sleeve. Not that it mattered in the end, as we eventually found the exit; though it was only after we were foiled at least five times by re-finding the entrance – including once using my “guaranteed, fail-safe way of navigating out of a maze” (i.e. keep your right hand on the wall). Maybe it’s the left hand that’s guaranteed…

There was also one of those suspension-bridge-through-a-tunnel-surrounded-by-spinning-lights jobbies for the punters’ pleasure. Oh my goodness, it was so disorienting! I couldn’t believe how off balance it made us! It was only about five metres long, but that was more than enough – I was happy to emerge from the other side (albeit feeling a little sea-sick!).

I had expected that there’d be more displays that erred on the “not” end of the “believe it or not” scale – like more optical illusions, and things of that nature. But overall, the walk through was very entertaining, and there were a number of exhibits that extracted an “oohhhh!!” type of reaction from me. But, at the rather outlandish price of £20 to go in, it’s probably not something that I’d recommend to anyone who didn’t have it on their “to-do” list to begin with.