Sunday 1 March 2015

Science City

Whilst in Kolkata I had 2 parks to visit and the first was Science City, an educational park.

Coconuts growing just outside the park.

Science City opened in 2007 and as it's name implies is a park that aims to educate and entertain at the same time. You pay to enter the park and some of the attractions within are an additional charge.

Quite an interesting array of souvenirs if that is what they really sell. Unfortunatley it wasn't open today.

This is the cycle ride. It only goes over a small part of the park and wasn't running at all today.

There is some nice architecture in the park. These are some of the exhibition halls that house the upcharge attractions.

This little hedge maze contains a lot of interactive science things to play with. I think I spent quite a bit of time mucking about with these.

The bouncing dragon was down too. 



At the back corner of the park is the rollercoaster, called Gravity Coaster. The write up explains the science involved with the forces that the ride gives. Education in India is promoted heavily (I wish our kids were as keen to learn as the Indian ones), and I had seen signs for colleges in some of the parks. This one was taking it a little further by explaining the physics of the rides. Nice! The ride, whilst having an unusual layout wasn't that good overall.



Within an indoor hall there are a number of ball mazes, easily the largest ones I've ever seen. The central atrium was a huge tower of ball-coaster track and around the walls were a number of others. Like most of the park, not all of this was running, but those that were running were fun to watch.

This was down too, but is designed to show gyroscopic forces.

This 3D globe when viewed from the right angle takes on the form of a famous Indian person. I don't know who it is though.

These are famous Indian scientists commemorated in this little garden.

A nice mural!

I chose not to do the dinosaur exhibit as we weren't allowed to take photos and they wanted me to pay an extra amount to see them. From watching a clip that someone did illegaly film on youtube the quality of the attraction wasn't the best and it was really a bit naughty of them to charge when other parks were doing similar for free.

A self-supporting tower using ropes to retain structure. Too scientific for me that one!

The domes were housing animals. They looked a bit sad. 

An old egyptian phone system. Talk into this statues ears and the person at the other one in the background can hear and respond. This doesn't work with just one person!

I think this was called "Sympathy Swing" basically a way of having one person swinging have some of their motion passed onto a second person. 

A mobius climbing frame. 

A funny name for an ice cream!

I caught these near the entrance. Well I guess how else are you expected to deliver a dinosaur in the post?

Science City was a park I expected to blitz just going in, riding the coaster, and leaving but where I ended up wasting time playing on all the experiments, but it's science so allowed. There aren't many parks that have a science bent, and there should be a lot more!

Science City is located in South-East Kolkata on JBS Haldane Avenue opposite the city's book fair.

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