Museum ExplorAR: A living guide to the galleries

Museum ExplorAR is back at the National Museum Cardiff this October, running from the 13th to the 18th and then again from the 20th to the 23rd. It's an augmented-reality tour that brings some of the museum's most popular exhibits to life, and if you've never tried it, it's a good way to see the galleries with a bit more going on than just the displays on the walls.

Rather than wearing goggles, you use a handheld electronic device that you hire from the welcome desk. A virtual guide called Lwna leads you through three different galleries, and as you go, the exhibits start to move and change. You'll spend time with underwater life, dinosaurs and a mammoth, so it's a fair bit of ground to cover across the natural world. The whole experience is available in English, Welsh and Japanese, and it's suitable for anyone aged two and over, which makes it an easy one to do with kids in tow.

It's not a new addition to the museum — it first launched in 2018 — but it's one of those things that works best when you've got a bit of time to wander. The tour runs in time slots from 10.00 to 16.00 on the days it's on, so you can pick a morning or an afternoon that suits you. It costs £7 per hour, and since museum admission is free, that's the only thing you'll be paying for. The museum itself is open from 10 am to 5 pm, Tuesday to Sunday, so you can easily spend the rest of your visit exploring the other collections at your own pace.