17

Yesterday we walked around Cardiff bay and Mermaid Quay. There's a giant festival currently going on in the middle of the open oval boardwalk, with a bunch of rides for children. There was a helter-skelter, the first time I'd seen one. There were also these plastic spheres floating on a pool with children inside. Like bubble soccer minus the control. And a ride that consisted of harnessing the kid to two elastic cords and letting them jump and flip on a trampoline (they go really high because of the cords). There was even live steel drumming happening.

It was fun to see the fair, but it covered up the entire quay so I couldn't see it how it was in Doctor Who. They used Mermaid Quay in a couple of key scenes during Tennant's run, and I got to lean on the exact same railing David and Freema Agyeman leaned on in one scene while Harkness ran across to them. Even with all the festivities, it was fun to imagine them filming it here exactly where I was standing, with the Tardis prop in the centre of the Quay.

We took a ride on the permanently installed ferris wheel. From there we could see the barrage that keeps the bay (fed by two rivers) fresh water, as well as the entire fair below us and the giant Doctor Who experience in the distance on the coast towards the barrage. They have a model of the Tardis set up in front of it, so when you look across the bay you can see a Tardis just sitting there. It's really cool. For a moment you can imagine that it's actually the real thing, sitting silently and innocently in Cardiff by the sea. After the Ferris wheel, we stopped at a Sainsbury's and got some kettle chips for the walk home. Then we walked home.

 

Today we went to the Doctor Who experience. It was really cool, especially for someone who knows a lot about the show. The more details you knew, the more you could enjoy it.

We left the house around 11:45am to start walking to the place. We booked our tickets last night. It's only another five minute walk from the bay to get there, a total of about twenty minutes. It's nice to be staying so close to the bay (as well as downtown- same distance in the other direction).

The lobby was cool enough- three daleks (one out of Lego), a Tardis, a weeping angel, an ice warrior, a vintage Doctor Who pinball machine, toy vending machines and coins pressers for souvenirs, gallifreyen robes and message boxes, and a cyberman's head. And this was even before getting through the doors. I was very excited to be there. I got a five centimetre tall dalek figurine from a vending machine. The boys got pressed pennies.

The first thing you do there is go through the "experience", a kind of live semi-interactive guided adventure with the twelfth Doctor. You start in a dark room, they give you the intro, then suddenly something "goes wrong" and red lights start flashing. The tour guide says we need to evacuate, but then a crack on the wall opens and suddenly we're in the heart of the Tardis. The whole set up is very clever: Capaldi has pre-recorded segments where he's "talking" to the tour guide, who responds at the proper times to make it seem like a two-way conversation. Each room is atmospherically lit and decorated. I think it would have been very easy to get swept away in the amazingness that is this world on screen coming to life around you, if it weren't for the twenty other people shuffling along with cameras and coats and backpacks and expressions of unimpressedness. Basically, you go through a series of rooms and travel in the Tardis and to Skaro and narrowly escape a room of daleks and a room of weeping angels, all while finding three crystals the doctor needs to save the day. It is all very cleverly done. I would love to go through again with a group of actors, and really get into the story with the tour guide. I want to go in with a group of people really committed to playing their roles, so much so that we surprise the guide. I think that could be a lot of fun, because the rooms and sets and sounds and lights were so realistic! I just need to take advantage of that and fully pretend it's real for the half hour or so that you get to be in there. I also think it would be an amazing job to be the tour guide. You get to act and be enthusiastic, and better you do the more fun people have. I would love to do that.

After the experience (very fun, almost surreal), you get released into the exhibition hall. Two levels of almost every prop, costume, and set (most originals) ever used on Doctor who. Needless to say I spent a good couple hours in there. They had three full Tardis consoles set up, including the one from nine's run. The original set, refurbished. You could stand right in there next to the doors leading outside the Tardis and just take it in. I stood there for a good while, inside the Tardis. It was just so real, right there, something I'd only ever seen on screen. I think if I ever get a chance to be on Doctor who, even just once, even just some person running away or a passerby or the human victim of some terrible alien, my life would be complete. Starting now, I have made that a goal in my life. Be on an episode of Doctor who at some point. That would be amazing. I mean it's not going to happen, but it can be a goal.

I spent a long time looking at all the costumes. They had all the costumes of the doctors of course, up to twelve, but they also had tons of the companion's costumes (again, most originals! I got to see the actual clothing the actors wore during filming. How awesome is that). Amy Pond, Rory, Donna Noble, Rose Tyler, Sarah Jane, Clara Oswald, River Song, Jack Harkness (and the Face of Boe- the original giant prop) Madame Vastra and Jenny (my two favourites), and Strax. There may have been more as well. There were all the monsters you could think of as well: all the different kinds and iterations and evolutions of daleks and cybermen, the silence, the ice warriors, the silurians, the veil, the scarecrows, the hath, the ood, Davros, the moment, the weeping angels, zygons, and many more including some from the older years that I didn't recognize. There was a yeti costume used back in the 70's or 60's, which was the oldest preserved screen-used costume of the BBC.

There were exhibits sharing interesting tidbits on the filming of the show. One was the fact that the original sound of the Tardis landing was made by scraping a key up a piano string. Very cool.

At the gift shop, I got a t-shirt, a Tardis tin of mints (which are too strong to eat, but I wanted the tin), and 10 themed postcards. Tobin got the latest sonic screwdriver to replace his other one which broke a while ago, by being stepped on I think. Then we walked home. It rained a bit, off and on, so we more like ran home taking breaks under sheltered areas.

All in all, I throughly enjoyed the Doctor Who experience. It reminded me of my love for the show, along with my love for film and acting in general. But mostly my love for the show. And I tried to take advantage of the cheapest time I would have to buy Doctor Who merchandise. An entire large-ish gift shop devoted to Doctor Who themed products, at reasonable prices. That does not come around often. If you wanted to, you could use that shop to wake up on your Doctor Who sheets staring at your Doctor Who poster in your Doctor Who jammies. Have a shower, dry off with your Doctor Who towel, then get dressed in your Doctor Who hoodie or dress.  Have cereal from your Doctor Who bowl and coffee in your Doctor Who mugs. Write a quick note on your Doctor Who notepad with your Doctor Who pen. Put some money in your Doctor Who wallet and don't forget your keys with the Doctor Who keychain or your Doctor Who bracelet or your £160+ Doctor Who gold watch or your official Doctor Who celery pin. Type a quick text on your phone with the Doctor Who case to say you might be late for the Star Trek meeting.

 

Then home. I watched a bit of a show called The Secret Life of Four-year-olds. It's like a reality drama, but with kids. It gets intense too. Marriages, friendships, candy stealing. I got really into it. Next time they're back with five-year-olds.

Canada got bronze in women's rugby! Yes! But we missed watching it because we were watching Naked Attraction instead. It's the weirdest dating show. All I'll say is that it would be banned in North America, I'm sure.

British TV, man.