living and learning: A week of two halves

We started off this week with two days when we weren't home much, first with a visit to Creswell Crags on Monday and then Fun Club on Tuesday.

Creswell Crags is somewhere that's been on my radar for quite a while and then cropped up when we were working our way through the Usborne History of Britain books as it's mentioned in the first one, Prehistoric Britain. We had never got around to visiting though, so when J organised a trip, including the Ice Age tour, I decided that we should cease the opportunity. We got there in plenty of time and met up with the others for the tour at 11 o'clock. The tour was of Robin Hood Cave, the largest at Creswell Crags, in which lots of evidence of seasonal habitation has been found. Although the cave is really quite deep with a couple of chambers, it was only the entrance that was lived in since the dwellers would have been smoked out of the deeper parts.

View from the entrance area towards the back.

M discovered that enclosed spaces are really not her thing when we moved further into the cave and so waited outside while the rest of us looked at and handled some of the things (although I'm presuming at least some of the were replicas) that had been found.

A bone needle with its case.

Various artifacts of stone, bone, antler and gut.

While it was clear what many of the things were there was one that the guide told us nobody had come up with any good answer to what it might have been for.

The mystery object.

After the tour we headed back to the visitor centre for lunch and then, since the girls and I had walked on with the guide while most of others dawdled, we had finished our lunch before everyone else. K was in a bit of a funny mood and not feeling particularly sociable, which actually worked out rather well, since it meant that as we were ready to carry on before everyone else we had the exhibition to ourselves. It wasn't particularly extensive, but what there was was interesting. Both girls particularly enjoyed finding the cave art in one of the interactive parts.

Can you see the horse's head?

There it is!

And the explanation.

I often find that going places in a group very definitely has its cons as well as its pros, one of which is that the children, certainly mine, but I would imagine many others too, don't spend as much time looking at the things we've come to look at because they're too busy having fun and catching up with friends. We had the best of both worlds on this occasion, since after looking at the exhibition and having a treat in the cafe, we joined the others in the playground for a while before heading home.

Tuesday was Fun Club and as usual at this time of year it was the Easter session. There were various Easter and spring crafts to do and both K & M really enjoyed a variety of them.