CHOC FULL OF FUN
A family day out to Cadbury World is the sweetest of tickets,
The last bar of Dairy Milk, encased in that familiar purple wrapper, may have long since rolled off production lines in the space now occupied by Cadbury World, but chocolate still runs through the core of this tourist attraction on Birmingham’s south-west fringes.
A gloriously retro Cadbury logo at the top of this 19th cocoa temple greets us, erstwhile signage that has seen millions of Cadbury classics boxed up and shipped across the world.
The heady aroma hits our brood as soon as we wander over the threshold. The question on our lips? how much might one get to gobble, Augustus Gloop-style, during this 90-minute tour?
The answer comes quickly. We’re given a map and 12 — Twelve! — bars of favourites. Our six-yearold, Cleo, ponders the maths before exclaiming: ‘Three for me!’
‘Don’t overdo it, have a couple of squares and save the rest…’ I chastise to deaf ears, knowing this is no place for the Sugar Police.
I dare you to leave the adjacent shop empty-handed, where a sizeable bag of mis-shapes — the wonky veg of the chocolate world — will set you back just £3.
Opened in 1991, Cadbury World unfolds over two floors of one of england’s most famous factories.
Like wide-eyed Charlie Buckets, we begin in an Aztec Jungle themed area, where cacao pods were first fawned over, before we hurtle through time with conquistador hernán Cortés, who gifted europe the ambrosial beans.
Belle, nine, and Cleo love the time travel, especially when we blink out on to early 19th-century Brum, with its replica of Quaker John Cadbury’s Bull Street grocery store, which sold drinking chocolate to obsessed Georgians.
I’m gripped when I read a notice about how a young Roald Dahl, then a boarder at nearby Repton School, landed himself the world’s tastiest job testing out Cadbury’s latest inventions with his pals. As inspiration for a book goes, it must have been mouth-watering fodder.
There’s no Willy Wonka-style host today though; this tour is run by a slick bunch of microphone wearing, Covid-conscious teens.
There’s plenty of practical fun. The ‘have a Go’ area sees a purple-coated technician whip up the kind of filled chocolates you’d find in a tin of Roses. We try writing our names in liquid chocolate and gawp at chocolatiers behind glass.
There are surreal elements. We squeeze into a ‘bean mobile’ and trundle around the psychedelic ‘Cadabra’ world.
A circus-master on stilts towers above guests as we queue for the 4D cinema, the most futuristic of Cadbury World’s attractions. It’s a visual spectacle to rival Disney.
From our comfortable, very purple seats we don our special specs and board a Crunchie rollercoaster, then a Creme egg airship.
It’s a thrilling end to the most delicious of day-trips. Now, pass me a mis-shape, won’t you?