HOLIDAYS  BUYING  HELPLINE Great Trails: London Tour 3 Child's play There are hundreds of different attractions for kids in London, but you probably already know the most popular, so here is a selection of the lesser-known but interesting venues. Visiting London with a family can be pricey after you've paid for your Travelcard and something to eat, so we've included attractions that are either free or reasonably priced, so that your kids' enjoyment doesn't have to depend on the size of your budget. 1 IMAX 3-D CINEMA Britain's largest cinema screen, as tall as five double-decker buses, uses state-of-the-art technology to show films in 3D format, which you watch while wearing special eyeglasses. There's usually a film about ocean life, plus a high-tech animation feature, both of which are excellent for exploiting the screen's capabilities. You'll feel like you're in the middle of the movie, and find yourself ducking to avoid flying objects, or feeling giddy on the rollercoaster. It's a real flight of fantasy for kids. Even the 2D films, such as the one about outer space, are out of this world. 2 LONDON AQUARIUM This relatively new attraction in the city is housed inside County Hall, on the south bank of the Thames, where huge tanks display thousands of sea creatures. Kids will love the more unusual species such as the water-spitting archer fish, the translucent jellyfish and the brightly-hued tropical fish. For us, the most impressive sight was the Pacific tank with its sharks up to seven feet long. Another favourite was the 'touch tank', where you can stroke the rays as they poke their silky noses out of the water. There are interactive computer terminals, too, to add to your enjoyment. 3 POLLOCK'S TOY MUSEUM The Museum fills two old houses, joined together to create a labyrinth of tiny rooms with warped, squeaky floorboards. Upstairs, you'll find a display which represents a boy's den from the early 1900s, with WWI tanks, penny toys and a chemistry set. Elsewhere, there is a particularly arresting display of hundreds of life-like wax dolls of every shape and size. Another popular room contains toy soldiers, teddy bears and dolls' houses. The Museum shop is stocked with a range of traditional toys, many of which would make great Christmas stocking-fillers. 4 COVENT GARDEN The Piazza at Covent Garden is one of London's few pedestrianised areas. It's great for kids, who will love watching the street entertainers, including jugglers, acrobats, comedians, fire-eaters and mime artists. Covent Garden is well known for its shops, too: familiar names in a smart, Georgian setting plus crafts and hand-made jewellery in the Apple Market area. But there are plenty of shops to delight the children, including a Pollock's Toy Museum shop Peter Rabbit & Friends, and the London Dolls House Company selling miniature mansions from a variety of historical periods, and all the accessories imaginable. 5 LONDON'S TRANSPORT MUSEUM Kids love this light, airy museum housed in the covered flower market of the original Covent Garden. Here, they can play with old transport vehicles such as horse-drawn carts, motorised trams, and buses. Fifteen Kids' Zones, with touch-screens, levers and buttons, help children learn about London's transport over the years. Among the most popular attractions are the bus and tube train simulators. Younger children will enjoy the Fun Bus. Older children, and adults, may appreciate the 5000 London Transport posters (some are classic designs) stored on CD-Rom. 6 CHANGING OF THE GUARD You know why the pussycat went to London, so why not take your kids to visit the Queen, too? These days you can go inside Buckingham Palace (Aug-Sept) but it's a bit boring for kids – and pricey, too. Better to get a snatch of pomp and ceremony at the Changing of the Guard, which you can watch for free from outside the palace railings. At 11.27am each day from April-August (alternate days for the rest of the year) you can watch the red-coated, bear-skinned Foot Guard regiments swap places with their comrades to take up the post of the Queen's Guard. It's a fascinating ceremony, with barked orders, a military band and an intriguing series of marching patterns. The event can become over-crowded in high season so, for a better view, try following the replacement guards as they march up St James's or Birdcage Walk, half an hour beforehand. 7 THE MUSEUM OF LONDON This is the city's own museum. Entry is free and it is a refreshingly unstuffy place in which to learn about life here over the millennia, from prehistoric times to the present day. Children will enjoy the miniature scale models of scenes such as a stone-age mammoth hunt, Roman London, 17th-century London Bridge with houses and shops crammed along its length, and the Great Fire, complete with sound effects and commentary. And for a chance to feel what it was like to be there, enter one of several lifesize interiors, including rooms from Roman, Stuart and Edwardian times. Among the most impressive is the room where the Lord Mayor's golden coach is kept. The whole experience is fascinating for every age group, and makes a great place in which to spend an afternoon. 8 THE MONUMENT This 202ft-high stone column, crowned with an urn of gilded flames, was designed by Sir Christopher Wren and Dr Robert Hooke in memory of those who died in the Great Fire of London. It remains the tallest isolated column in the world, and its height mirrors its exact distance from where the fire started: if it were to fall in the correct direction, its tip would lie at the end of Pudding Lane. The best bit, for children, is the climb up a spiral staircase of 311 steps to the balcony at the top of the Monument, and the view it affords. On your descent, a certificate of achievement award is presented to adults and children alike. HOME PAGE | TOP OF PAGE GREAT TRAILS   Local life  Bargain days out  Child's play ARCHIVE   Previous trails PLANNING  Where to go… 1 IMAX 3-D Cinema Charlie Chaplin Walk, Waterloo, SE1 Tel 020 7902 1234 Website www.bfi.org.uk/imax Charges Adults £6.95; under 16s £4.95; under fives, free 2 London Aquarium County Hall, Westminster Bridge Road, SE1 Tel 020 7967 8000 Charges Adults £8.75; child £5.25; under threes, free Open 10am-5pm Mon-Sun 3 Pollock's Toy Museum 1 Scala Street, W1 Tel 020 7636 3452 Charges Adults £3; under-18s £1.50 Open 10am-4.30pm Mon-Sat 4 Covent Garden, WC2 Website Click Here 5 London's Transport Museum Covent Garden Piazza, WC2 Tel 020 7379 6344 Charges Adults £5.95; children free Open 10am-6pm Mon-Thurs and Sun; 11am-6pm Fri Website Click Here 6 Changing of the Guard Buckingham Palace, SW1 Tel 020 7930 4832 Website Click Here 7 The Museum of London London Wall, EC2 Tel 020 7600 3699 Website Click Here Charges Free Open 10am-6pm Tues-Sat; 12pm-6pm Sun 8 The Monument Monument Street, EC3 Tel 020 7626 2717 Charges Adults £1.50; children 50p; under fives, free …and where to eat 1 & 2 National Film Theatre Café, Waterloo Bridge, SE1 Tel 020 7928 3232 3 Pizza Express, 30 Coptic Street, WC1 Tel 020 4636 3232 4 Market Café, The Piazza, Covent Garden, WC2 Tel 020 7836 2137 5 Caffé Uno, 37 St Martin's Lane, WC2 Tel 020 7836 5827 6 Cake House Café in St James's Park (nr Buckingham Palace) Tel 020 7930 1793 7 Ask Pizza 103 St John Street, EC1 Tel 020 7253 0323 8 Café Rouge Hillgate House, Limeburner Lane, EC4 Tel 020 7329 1234 HOLIDAYS  BUYING  HELPLINE Contact Practical Motorhome Best viewed in screen resolution 800 x 600 using I.E.4 or Netscape 4 or later.