Age of Dinosaur Museum

Winton, the town of dinosaurs.

We couldn’t pass through Outback Queensland without stopping at a museum on the dinosaur trail.

We picked the Age of Dinosaur Museum, we felt that we would learn the most from this experience. We were pushing it for time, but we made it there to get all three guided tours in.

We all learnt so much. At the fossil lab we discovered how fossils move to the surface and are discovered. How they dig, preserve and move the fossils to the lab and how they are restored.

We took a large golf cart out to The Stampede. Australia’s largest fossil, found in Winton. It was discovered in a river bed and is made up hundreds of dinosaur footprints. It was taken apart piece by piece and put back together in the museum like a giant jigsaw puzzle. It was amazing listening to the talk and hearing all the different things they could tell from the footprints.

Finally, we went to the collection room, which held their most complete fossil ‘Matilda’ a sauropod. We learnt how they use the fossils to predict size, movement, and diet. We even learnt about some ways in which they thought these dinosaurs may have died through an interactive video. This was an excellent way to help the kids visualise what life would have been like for the dinosaurs 95 million years ago.

A great experience for all.Read more