Ventures and Adventures of a Vermonter Abroad: *TARDIS noise*

I look so natural next to the TARDIS. Wouldn't I make a great companion?

On Saturday, I made the trek to Cardiff Bay with two friends (London-Roomie Kirsten and Caitlin) on a rather cold and blustery day. Destination: Doctor Who Experience. This is a museum dedicated to all things Who-related.

Oh, look. It's a TARDIS on the docks.

Making our way up to it!

The Museum started with an interactive exhibit (which we couldn't take pictures of). I'll do my best to reconstruct it for you (To those who don't have a background in Doctor Who, this may get a little confusing).

Entrance to the interactive exhibit

You begin in a dark room with a screen playing clips from the show and Matt Smith narrating over top about "fixed points in time" and how this moment right now is not one of them. The screen then breaks open to reveal a crack in the universe. You end up on Starship UK. There are various artifacts from the show to be seen. The Doctor then appears on the TV screen there. He hoping to find Amy and Rory, but instead got a bunch of "people who look like they're out shopping". The Doctor is trapped inside a second Pandorica (The same color and everything! He is not impressed). Using his sonic screwdriver, he makes the TARDIS appear. You get to assist in flying the TARDIS! Priority, of course, is given to the kids. Adults, according to the Doctor, are boring and drink coffee and go "blah, blah, blah" a lot. You get captured by Daleks, end up in an area populated by Weeping Angels and then to the Pandorica 2.0. Not to spoil it too much, but you get 3D glasses for this part. It was so cool!

After the interactive exhibit, you enter the museum-y part. This is where they have set pieces, props, costumes and more from the show throughout the years.

9th/10th Doctors' era TARDIS interior

5th Doctor's (?) TARDIS interior

They have props and costumes from the 2012 Xmas special!

BARROWMAN!

Half an Ood. It was cool seeing how they made the masks for them.

Daleks through the ages

The Dalek Emperor! He is only up to my waist in real life.

From what I understand, almost all the costumes at the museum were used on the show.

Time Lords through the ages

First Doctor's Costume!

Tom Baker's scarf. It is absurdly long.

9th Doctor's outfit. Probably the most normal-looking of the bunch. 9th was also my first Doctor.

TENNANT!

What can I say, Time Lords have style!

Even in perhaps the most British thing ever, I can't escape my birth-country

After a walk through the giftshop, we decided to stroll around Mermaid Quay a bit and sightsee.

Little not-Lego Doctor Who toys!

BBC Cymru Wales studios. Sadly, no actors that we could see.

A war memorial. Poppies are the flower of remembrance here, hence the red accents.

I think this statue commemorates an Antarctic expedition. Prof. Kinder would be so proud of my attempts to interpret art.

The church where Roald Dahl was christened. It is now an art gallery, I believe.

Cross-Bay shot of Mermaid Quay

We went into a shop that sold all sorts of different types of Welshcakes. Since I've been here, I have whole-heartedly embraced the Welshcake. Anyone who sends me a quality recipe for them will have my eternal gratitude. We also explored the menus of different restaurants (Italian, Indian and Dim Sum). We finally settled on a place called Salt for our lunch. I had salmon risotto, which was delicious. I got another compliment on my colorful credit card. The guy working at the bar was Welsh, so there was a bit of mutual accent appreciation going on. It still boggles my mind that my accent is pleasing to the ear. To finish off the adventure, we did a super quick self-guided Torchwood (Doctor Who spin-off) tour.

Fun Fact #12: The area where Torchwood was headquartered in the show has become (in real-life) a memorial to a fan-favorite character that was killed off.

**NEEDLESS TO SAY, SPOILERS**