Pointless (The Travel Game)...

Me and my Fiance love watching the TV show Pointless. We always have a laugh playing along, so when I was offered the chance to review the Pointless travel game, I was like 'Yeahhh!'.

Courtesy of Wikipedia.

For those of you that aren't familiar with the BBC1 game show, it is hosted by Alexander Armstrong and the concept of the game is that you have to try and think of the most obscure answer rather than the best answer (scoring the most points) to each question you are asked (at some point before the show each question is asked to 100 people and they are given 100 seconds to come up with as many answers as they can - only correct answers are considered) and try to score the lowest number of points. Even better is to get a pointless answer which scores zero.

The full sized board game is also available to purchase, but I got to review the travel version. It is recommended for people of ages 10+ and for 2-4 players or teams. It contains 120 questions, 1 question card holder, 1 'Pointless' pencil, 1 answer and score sheet pad (30 sheets which are double sided) and 1 set of rules.

The game is similar to the TV show in terms of the whole concept of the show, so you have to try and find the lowest scoring answer for each question. The game has many differences to the TV show though in terms of the following:

- You can play with as little as two people if you want to. You don't have to play with solely four teams to start with like the TV show.

- In the TV show there are elimination rounds, before the final two teams with the best scores (the lowest scores) compete in the head to head and the winner of that gets to play in the final. In the travel game, there are no elimination rounds, everyone gets to play all the way through to the end, so no one gets knocked out during play. I suppose if you wanted to play like the TV show you could just adapt the rules.

- Each round is the same and the player or team with the lowest score of each round, gets to go first in the next round. When it comes to the end of the fifth round, the player or team with the most Pointless answers (scoring zero) gets to go first. At the end of the sixth round, the player or team with the overall lowest score wins the game.

- Answers are written down on an answer sheet rather than spoken out loud in turn. The scores (that your answers get) are also written down and recorded on your answer sheet.

- One player is to be chosen to be the question master, but can also play the game.

- The game isn't electronic, the questions and answers are on cards (they are also double sided) within a special card holder (which hides the scores from prying eyes ;)), so the questions and answers to choose from are on view and the scores are only revealed when each card is taken out of the card holder.

- All answers are on the cards to choose from, where as in some rounds on the TV show you have to think of some answers yourself.

Players are advised from the rules card that at least one of the answers could be false on both sets of answers on each card and at least one of the answers could be Pointless on each set. Players can't select an answer given by another player, hence the reasoning behind who goes first in each round. There are two sets of answers for each question, so each player or team gets the chance to answer the same question twice (similar to the TV show, where the two people on each team both get a chance to answer the same question).

The above points are the main ones about the travel game, but the rules card explains all :). You can read more about the TV show Pointless here.

There are a few errors within the travel game, on the game cards. I haven't gone through all the cards but whilst me and Si were playing, we noticed a few things. See if you can see what's wrong with the answer sections of both of these cards before finding out below...

Have you seen what's wrong?

On the first card, Nepal is named twice within the two answer sets. If someone answers Nepal from the first answer set and later the score of 10 is revealed, when the second answer set becomes available to choose from, no one is going to choose Nepal again knowing it isn't a Pointless answer and they will already know the score is 10. There is no point in it being there, so it's got to be an error.

On the second card, Estonia is there twice in the second answer set, the top one has a score of 2 and the one further down has a cross by it meaning that it is apparently an incorrect answer...this made us laugh when we saw it...go figure?! It didn't affect our game because there was only me and Si playing, so we just chose answers around the errors, but if there are a lot of you or a lot of teams then it might be different, especially if the error is on the second set of answers, when you have already answered from the first set. If the number of players or teams matches the amount of answers there is to choose from, then you will probably have to just re-start the round.

I kind of wish it was an electronic version as even the full sized board game isn't electronic. It's still great fun though!

You can buy the game from stockists such as: Argos, Amazon, Smyth's, The Entertainer and Tesco. I have also seen the game being sold on Ebay if you like shopping on there. Not all places sell both the travel game and the full sized game, so you will have to check what they have available. The travel game usually retails for under £10 and the full sized game for under £20. Prices vary for each stockist.

Do you watch Pointless? Is this game something you'd be interested in playing?

Let me know if you have any board games that are television shows!

Thanks for reading!

Gem XxOo

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Ripley's Believe It or Not! (Blackpool, July 2012)...

So, for those of you following/reading my Blackpool reviews/vlogs, I have another one for you. Another attraction me and Simon went to in Blackpool was 'Ripley's Believe It or Not!'. The only other Ripley's in the UK is in London and me and Si went to that one a few years back. It was on the off chance really, as it was really wet and we were walking around, spotted it and decided to go in. We loved it. It's full of interesting, fascinating facts and unusual items so we were excited to have a look around the one in Blackpool.

For those of you not familiar with 'Ripley's Believe It or Not!', it is basically a museum of unbelievable and fascinating facts and unusual items. Ripley is Robert Ripley, the cartoonist, explorer, reporter, adventurer, illustrator, collector and seeker of the odd and unusual facts/items that appear in all of Ripley's attractions. You can find out more about him here.

The majority of facts and items are different in the Blackpool one, compared to the London one. So you don't have to worry about it all being the same. There is one thing I remember being the same and that was the mirror where it shows you how to roll your tongue. If you carry on round the amusement you will come to a double sided mirror where you can see people sticking their tongues out and trying to roll their tongue. It's quite funny to be honest watching people, as they obviously don't know people can see them doing it, until they get around to the other mirror side and realise :-). So, when we saw that we recognised it from the London one, but that's the only thing that stood out to me as being the same.

Ripley's in Blackpool is located on the promenade, by the Pleasure Beach on Ocean Boulevard.

Whether you are travelling by road, rail or air, it is pretty easy to find. There isn't a direct link as it is on the home-page, but if you look on the right hand side of the website homepage, you will see a map/directions. If you are travelling by car, it tells you where the nearest place to park is here. We had a weekly tram/bus pass whilst we were there, so we got the tram, which took about 5-10 mins from our guest-house.

The attraction is open daily from 10am. In the Summer/in season months, it is open every day, but when it comes to the Winter/out of season months, then there is only certain days they are open. It's best to check the dates on the website, if you are thinking of booking ahead. Or contact the attraction. It's £12 for adults and £6 for children, but you can get discount vouchers and group discounts on their website and often whilst you are in Blackpool, or even before you go, you will see 2 for 1 vouchers in magazines, papers, on the back of leaflets/receipts etc. So keep your eyes peeled because who doesn't like a discount! There is a leaflet you can grab on the way in, which has the museum layout inside, so you can see where to go/where you are going etc. However, the museum leads you from room to room, so you are sure not to miss anything :-).

There aren't any refreshment areas within the museum, but this isn't something you are going to be in all day. There is a gift shop at the end, which sells memento's to remind you of your visit to the attraction and I'm sure I remember there being a cold drink fridge aswell...if you are desperate for a drink when you come out :-). There is a funny thing inside the museum, which is a fridge that says: 'Don't forget to grab your free drink'. So you open the fridge and see lots of empty drink cans and it basically laughs in your face lol. As if you get a free drink...haha!

We went to the attraction on the 9th July 2012 (ignore the date on the pictures, my camera date/time is set wrong, I must sort it! Lol). There weren't many people in there to be honest, so you could stay and look at any of the facts/items as long as you wanted, because no one was hanging around you trying to have a look. Another couple went in the same time as us and as we were going around the museum, a few other people caught up with us. So it wasn't totally empty, but it was quiet. It took us about an hour to get around the whole thing. We didn't read every single little thing though, we just read those bits of info/facts that caught our eye. Each item has a detailed explanation by it, so you aren't left wondering what something is, it is explained for you :-). It did seem to go quite quick, whilst we were in there, but time always does when you're having fun and we enjoyed it on the whole. There are two floors, 8 galleries and 10 televisions. Here are a couple of my favourite bits of the museum...

'Can you lift both legs at the same time?'. Me and Simon had some fun with this, on many shots we took, you could see our other leg/foot, but I think I mastered it in the end...just about :-).

This was a Princess Diana piece, make solely from pennies. Some of the pennies were shaded in different colours, but I thought it was amazing that you could get a picture so spot on, with just pennies! I should try it myself lol.

There is a lot of interactive parts to the museum, for example...funny mirrors, puzzles, tongue rolling and much more! You can see some footage from our trip here, by watching my Blackpool Vlog: Day 2 YouTube video. I don't want to ruin what's inside the museum by naming most of the things, but you can take a look here at what you can expect to find.

We had a fab time learning about unusual items and finding out fascinating facts. Now we have been once, I can't say we would go again, because we already know what's in there. It's the same with the London one to be honest. Unless they both have a total refurb and have all new items in there. However, if you have never been to either, then I would deffo recommend taking the time to go and have a look. It's a good way to enjoy an hour or so, for not such a ridiculous price :-).

If there is anything else you would like to know, please ask!

Have you ever been to any of the Ripley attractions?

Thanks so much for reading. Please follow, like and comment.

Gem XxOo

Blackpool Zoo (July 2012)...

Those of you that watch my YT videos and follow me on Twitter, might remember me saying that I was going to Blackpool for a week from the 8th to the 13th of July with Simon. It was one of my birthday presents from him and I must say we had a blast! We did a lot of stuff whilst we were there and so I made sure I took a lot of pictures and I also vlogged along the way. You can see these vlogs on my 'Live Love Laugh' YouTube channel.

I thought I would carry out some review features for you of the things that we did in Blackpool, so you can get a feel for what most of the attractions are like. Me and Si love zoo's, monkeys tend to be our faves as they are so characteristic and fascinating to watch. So, saying that, I'm going to start off with Blackpool Zoo...

It was quite easy to get to the zoo, we caught the seasonal bus from the town centre, outside BHS on Corporation Street. These buses run quite often and it took us about 15-20 minutes to get to the zoo, so we were there before we knew it! The stop is just outside the entrance of the zoo, so when you have enjoyed your day, if you're catching the bus back, the stop will be right there waiting for you, meaning you don't have to walk far. I found this really convenient and like I said before, the buses run quite regularly. If you are using other methods of transport to get to the zoo, there is a 'find us' page on their website. If you are travelling by car, the zoo has car parking facilities costing just £2.50 per car, per visit.

The zoo is open every day of the year at 10am, except for Christmas Day. It costs £15.50 for adults to get into the zoo and for those of you with kids, it's £11 for 3-15 year olds. Under 3's get in for free. There are plenty of other price offers, the chance to become a member and a way to save by buying tickets online, on their website. I didn't think the prices were too bad, put it this way, I've seen worse zoo prices and you can spend a whole day at the zoo, so it's not over before you know it, like some other Blackpool attractions can be. At the ticket kiosk you are given a leaflet of talk/feeding times and the chance to buy a zoo guide for £2.50. Simon wanted to buy this as like I said before, we love zoo's and there are plenty of facts and info within the guide, aswell as a map. However, you can print off the map from their website, so you don't have to pay for it, if you don't want to :-).

There is a gift shop and a coffee shop within the entrance hall of the zoo and a large cafe within the actual zoo. We didn't buy any food from the zoo, as we had grabbed some lunch whilst we were waiting for the bus ha, but we did have some drinks at the zoo (a slush for me...yum! and a Dr. Pepper for Si), which cost approx £3.50.

Onto our actual visit! We went on the 10th July (Tuesday) and it was quite a chilly day and also kept spitting throughout. We did notice that the zoo was quite quiet to be honest, but when we thought about it, it was a weekday, not a school holiday and most adults were probably at work, so we gathered that this was the reason. Unless people were planning to come on the morning, but saw the weather and decided against it. Don't get me wrong, it's lovely if it's warm whilst walking around a zoo, but it wasn't that bad and definitely could have been worse. We did notice that there were a lot of school trips at the zoo, loads of little kids getting really excited...bless em! It was quite funny to be honest, as there were several times throughout the day when I was looking at animals through a window (the lions and tigers spring to mind) and suddenly there would be a herd of kids running to the window, surrounding me and encasing me in the middle! Ha.

In total, we were at the zoo for about 3-4 hours, which gave us enough time to see all of the animals, read about them (there are info signs by each animal enclosure) and enjoy watching them for a while (especially the little Monkeys, soo cute!), stop for a drink and listen to a talk. We managed to watch the 'Birds of the World' talk/display, at 1:30pm, which lasted for about 20 minutes. It was really interesting and amazing to see how the birds had been trained and what they could do. We wanted to see the Sealion display at 2:00pm, but we got caught up watching the monkeys and didn't realise the time. There was a Sealion training talk/display on at 4:00pm, but again we were caught up watching other animals and again didn't realise the time. It was 4:20pm by the time we realised and it finished at 4:30pm, but we were basically at the end of the zoo and ready to go home anyway as we were quite chilly. So, if you know which animals you would like to see talks/displays on, then I'd recommend giving someone the job of keeping an eye on the time, because if you're watching fascinating animals that just draw you in, it is SO easy to forget about a talk/display that you may want to see.

Like I said, I took a lot of pictures, so I thought I would show you a few favourites here:

Yes, they had Guinea Pigs at the zoo!

      This one reminded me of my piggie Belle that died this year.

There are lots of other fun things to do at Blackpool Zoo, for example: animal experiences (feed a tiger, train the sea lions, tickle a tapir or become a keeper for the day), play areas and activities around the zoo (inflatables, crazy golf, or a miniature train for when your legs are tired :-)), a children's farm, play barn, nursery, shopping in the gift shop, dining and you can even have a zoo party or adopt an animal! There are also plenty of opportunities for people to learn at the zoo, including education sessions for school groups, a zoo keeper academy and a chance to do some work experience.

The zoo also has toilets situated by the entrance of the zoo and within the actual zoo, baby-changing facilities are available in all toilets, wheelchairs and pushchairs can be hired from reception, members of staff at the zoo can help with lost children and first aid, you can enquire at reception regarding lost property and there are hand washing facilities situated around the zoo. Put it this way, this zoo has a lot to offer and it's worth checking out the website to see if there is anything you would like to do/enquire about before you go :-).

If you do go to Blackpool Zoo, I hope you have a fab day! I know we sure did (I just hope you have better weather:-)).

If there is anything else you would like to know, please ask!

What's your favourite animal in a zoo?

Thanks so much for reading. Please follow, like and comment...it motivates me to blog more for you lovelies :-).

Gem XxOo