Winston Churchill's Britain At War Experience

Sorry to say but this really was a let down. At £10.45 (where did the 45p come from?) it did not live up to expectations or value for money. We walked through this experience feeling nothing, smelling very little & the highlight was seeing objects from my Grandmothers house. Sorry London but come on sort out the costs for these places.

Firstly let me say that the Battle of Britain is one of my favorite periods in world history. The stoic British attitude and their stamina have always struck a chord in me and I highly respect them for what they went through from 1939 - 1941 especially, but even after the US entered the war what with buzz bombs and whatnot still pestering them day and night with sudden death and destruction. So, needless to say, a museum like this one USED to be draws me like a magnet.

Secondly, let me state that I toured this same museum in 2002. Was WAY better then! Why? Because they had some "experience" built into the Battle of Britain EXPERIENCE Museum. Back then, they put you inside a bombshelter like would've been in the day and you heard the sirens the increasing volume of the "crumping" of bombs overhead - complete with a bit of dust falling from the shelter ceiling - then the bombs got VERY loud (close) the lights flickered and went out, the whole thing shook for several seconds then when the all clear sounded you stepped out the other side of the shelter into the bombed out and burning collapsed ruin of the shopping district you'd just been looking at all nice and intact moments before. THAT was an experience - and a QUALITY one at that! Unfortunately, now they don't do the shelter experience and you just blandly walk thru several displays that taper off into this unexplained civilian shopping district look and then down some stairs and into the bombed out areas. With no guide or narration, it really loses something anyway, but I say, BRING BACK THE SHELTER EXPERIENCE! (cause it adds so much more to the visitors' experience and really gives an appreciation for what the citizens of London went through then.)

I had a traveling business companion with me this go round. We'd just came from the Churchill Museum/Cabinet War Rooms Museum and the whole Britain at War Experience thing just struck him as totally hokey. I know he would have enjoyed it so much more if he'd been able to go through the bomb shelter experience as I'd been fortunate enough to do back in '02.

I would've gave it 5 bullets back then, and am averaging both times I've went to only 2 bullets.

Serious history students seeking insight to Winston Churchill, or Britain's World War Two history, will be disappointed by this London tourist attraction. The site is more tourist trap than museum. Fittingly located just past the even tackier "London Dungeon", the Britain At War Experience is a a very amateurish experience indeed.

By all means visit the Cabinet War Rooms and Winston Churchill Museum near St. James's Park--a real historic sight and a professional presentation of Churchill and the war experience--but avoid "Winston Churchill's Britain At War Experience."