In the Museum Vaults

Actually they're called the Collections, not the Vaults. That name doesn't convey the sense of discovering hidden treasure. Down stairs, through locked doors, below ground, with strict security, it had all the elements of a treasure hunt, even though the hiding place was a utilitarian metal cupboard.

Various Museum Departments manage different areas of the Collections. I had access (under supervision) to Palaeontology Invertebrates. Close by were Vertebrates and in the furthest aisle, with gorgeous crystals gleaming out of occasionally opened doors and glimpsed in passing, was Mineralagy.

Next door, in the laboratory, a team, visiting from a New Zealand Museum, worked all day sitting at a powerful microscope, examining and sorting what looked like a bowl of fine gravel, but was actually fish bones, millions of years old.

It was tempting to spend my days picking up small boxes and examining the contents, wondering at the impossibility of holding in my hand the relic of a creature that lived 130 million years ago. Sometimes it was 500 million years ago but, you will remember, I kept being redirected back, in a firm and scientific manner, to the inland sea of the Cretaceous period.