4 year olds in York

[Gettingannoyednow]

I'm taking a 4 year old to York for the day tomorrow. I've got a spot at Jorvik booked, also thinking about DIG, the train museum, maybe a bus tour? Is there anything particularly brilliant for littlies I should know about? Recommendations gladly received. Thanks in advance 🙂

Train museum for sure

Train museum definitely. Will take a lot of the day. I don't even like trains and loved it.

Same

Train Museum it is! Many thanks xx

I wouldn’t miss the cathedral. I’d skip walking on the walls as I don’t bt think they all have rails

In the unlikely event that you're killing time after the National Railway Museum, hop over the way to the train station. I used to do that all the time when my ds was my little: grab a coffee for me and watch the trains with him! We always got a friendly wave from the drivers - ds loved it.

Edited to add: check what's open at the NRM. When we went a few months ago, one of the two main halls (the one with the royal trains) was completely closed.

I think there's stuff for kids in the art gallery and mine enjoyed the Castle Museum at around that age

Don’t miss the Wonderlab area of the railway museum, it’s an additional charge but well worth it- it’s an interactive science and engineering museum

The chocolate story is great,

There's way too much in York to do everything in one day, I guess it depends on the little one's (and your) stamina! Jorvik and NRM are about a mile apart, I've not used the buses in York for years but looks like there's one which might suit.

Alternative if you're likely to be able to take them again another time would be to combine Jorvik with a look at the castle and the Castle Museum, which iirc is quite fun (though not been there for years) as they're in the same area.

There is a land train that goes from the Railway Museum to the centre. My kids used to love it!

We took our just turned five year old to the railway museum a couple of weeks back and she loved it.

We hired a boat for an hour on the river when our son was 3, he loved it. Whatever you do don't go to the York Dungeons even when our children were much older they were terrified.
The railway museum was always a hit, you can send postcards directly from the museum, it's very sweet.

my kids loved Dig at that age! Tbh so did I, I thought it was very informative and interesting but fun at the same time, who doesn’t love digging at age 4!

Jorvik is crap. Train museum and Castle Museum, done.

Railway museum and Wonderlab are brilliant.

Dig is brill for that age.

The castle museum, my DC loved the old fashioned street bit

Agreed,we were disappointed with Jorvik considering the hype.
Nrm and castle museum.. absolutely brilliant.

Dig is good. We enjoyed the chocolate story but you are very rushed going round, it's a guided tour and they want to get as many groups as possible round - you don't really get time to look at everything properly. Unless we just went at a bad time.

That's what I was going to say.

River trip is nice in good weather.

Rowntree Park is great.

There's a cat trail - pick up a leaflet from tourist info near the minster. It's not specific cars like eg: the elephant/wallace and gromit etc trails that have been in cities recently, it just uses cats that are in the architecture, decor etc of buildings.

The Plush Cafe is fun - rainbow bagels!

My 4 year old lived Jorvik, Dig! and NRM.

Following

Def the train museum. I took my son there when he was 2.5. He still talks about it now 10 years later!