(Note I started this entry six months ago so many of the facts may be misremembered!)
I was in the neighbourhood (after a three and a half hour drive) so my friend and I popped into the Iwate City Coal and Fossil Museum in Iwaki, Fukushima.
There's a fountain with a plesiosaur outside the entrance.
As we entered the main foyer, a Minke and/or Mako looms overhead.
In the main hall, I'm first accosted by an extinct penguinesque creature of the order Plotopteridae.
I like the shadow from this angle.
Hey, from my home province is an Irish Dinosaur, Albert O'Saurus.
A skull and foot of our favourite carnivore T-Rex.
Coprolite also known as dino-poo!
Of course they have a Triceratops, all respectable museums have one.
The herbivore that's just fun to say, Parasaurolophus.
This knuckle-walking pterosaur is Anhanguera.
A few fossilized flyers.
A Mosasaurus skull. I love this guy in the Jurassic franchise.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Protostegidai. Doesn't have quite the same ring to it.
Pliosaurus, a type of Plesiosaurus.
Say "Cheese!", that's a nice Smilodon.
Behind him is an Eremotherium.
That giant ground sloth is really gigantic!
There is this one skeleton of a Mamenchisaurus that envelops the length of the display room. HUGE! (Click on this picture to embiggen.)
Finally from the main showroom, there's a Cryptoclidus. I wouldn't buy any currency from it.
In the gift shop area, there's another Plesiosaur just hanging around.
That's not all there is to see in this museum, there is also a history of Coal Mining in the basement. It's not all that interesting, though I did manage to find something worth photographing.
(Avert your eyes, be you faint of heart.)
Hey, what can I say. It must have been sweltering down there.
Yatta! There's a Centrosaurus skull in the gift shop.
In the lobby is Iwate's own little Nessie, Futabasaurus suzukii.
I couldn't leave empty-handed so I scored Futubasaurus to go.
There's a link at the top of the page if you want to find out about this place yourself. And if you want to learn more about each of the dinosaurs above, just click on the Latin and Google to your heart's content.
Since today is (well, was) September 29th, it's my Pseudo-Birthday, Michaelmas. To honour this prestigious occasion, I dug up my blog to commemorate it! Hopefully in a few days, I'll begin the Countdown to Halloween and blog daily.
