2007/05/12 natural_history_museum_20070421 Pictures taken when my brother and I visited the Natural History Museum in London on April 21, 2007.

The building that houses the museum was originally built during the Victorian era. It looks more like a cathedral than anything, I think. My brother described it along the lines of a "palace of science".

Everyone likes dinosaurs. RAR. Diplodocus skeleton is located in the main entrance hall. It's the first thing that you see when you enter the museum. (The second thing that you see are the security bods who check everyone's bags to make sure they're not terrorists. Because the Natural History Museum is clearly an obvious target for Al-Qaeda). ]]> One of my childhood favourites. Love the sticky-uppy thumbs. A pair of fearsome-looking weapons. Don't remember which species they're from; clearly a predator, though. The photo was my brother's idea; the shadow on the rear screen looks quite cool. think it's another Iguanadon, anyway &mdash look at the thumbs, and the lack of big, carnivore teeth. (I didn't take notes while walking around the museum, can you tell? :-) ]]> Deinonychus was a larger relative of Velociraptor, and was classified in the same genus for a while. The "raptors" in Jurassic Park were physically based on Deinonychus. ]]> Tyrannosaurus rex. The model is animatronic; I tried shooting a video of it, but there wasn't really enough light. ]]> T. rex, could be another of the large theropods. ]]> I saw this picture of the Dinobot leader in a "dinosaurs in fiction" montage towards the exit from the dinosaur exhibit.

Sometimes, extinct critters turn out not to be extinct. Which is cool. These ancient fish were thought long extinct until live specimens were found in South Africa in the 1930s. Live coelacanth are pale blue and silver; this one has faded somewhat. It doesn't look very appetising; I think I'll stick to haddock.