Discover Thomas & Friends Exhibition

The Thomas & Friends Exhibition near Atherstone is essentially a shrine to everyone's childhood engine obsession. You walk through rooms packed with original TV sets, memorabilia, and enough Thomas the Tank Engine merchandise to fill a goods yard. The centrepiece is genuine - vintage locomotives and carriages that actually appeared on screen, which does hit differently when you realise your six-year-old is staring at the same engine you watched in 1987.

It works brilliantly for families with children aged three to eight. Older kids tend to lose interest after forty minutes or so, and adults without nostalgia going for them might find it a bit slight. If your little ones are properly obsessed though, you'll easily spend two to three hours here without them demanding the exit.

The exhibition trades on authenticity rather than flashy interactivity. There's something quite lovely about that - no gimmicks, just the real items and a decent amount of detail about how the show was made. Some of the photography displays are genuinely interesting if you care about 1980s television production.

If you're basing yourselves at Nightingales Rustic Camping just down the road, this makes a solid half-day activity on a rainy afternoon. It's not worth planning your entire Warwickshire trip around, but paired with other local attractions it rounds out a family break nicely. Bring a packed lunch if possible - the on-site café is functional rather than inspiring.