Thursday, April 19, 2012

My kind of theme park


source: Wikipedia
I just ran across a really interesting place to visit in France. It's called Les Machines de L'ile Nantes (The Machines of the Isle of Nantes). It's an art exhibit / theme park that features giant mechanical animals sculpted out of wood and articulated with lots of machinery. Check out the photos and you'll what I mean. I hesitate to use the "sp" word, but it is rather steampunk in a good way, and for a good reason. Jules Verne was born in Nantes.

Many of the exhibits look interactive and one of the main attractions is a 40ft tall elephant that slowly walks around the park. You can ride inside him and enjoy the view or watch the gears working. Plus you can see the workshop where the artists are building new creatures. It all looks very cool, and very French.





Les Machines de l'Ile von ncep

The Daily Motion site has more videos about the making of the park. The official website doesn't have as many good photos as it should, but a quick search on flickr or google will turn up a ton if you're interested.

3 comments:

Carina said...

And how long would it take you to get from Berlin to Nantes? What's travel like there for day/weekend trips?
Looks like a lot of fun!

Christina said...

Unfortunately this is on the far west side of France so it would take a long time by train, but it's a quick and cheap flight to Paris which is pretty close.
For weekends we'll probably be exploring germany by train or taking advantage of all the cheap flights in Europe :)

Lily said...

aw man! I'd love to see this!! Is this the same group who did the girl bathing with the elephant? Do you remember that you tube video that came out a few years back?