Families in Peterborough can look forward to taking part in a free half-term interactive story-trail across the city centre this week. Peterborough Libraries has teamed up with QR code trail experts High Street Safari to create a free, interactive story-trail that is designed to encourage children to walk, engage in activity and most importantly, have a lot of fun.
Children will be able to track down the ‘Secret Carnival’ and its wily characters via smartphones and win a personalised, digital ‘selfie storybook’ at the end.
The trail works by utilising contactless QR codes displayed on vinyl stickers in the windows of participating venues, without the need for families to download or sign up to anything.
The Secret Carnival Family Trail is positioned around the city centre with 10 carnival characters, like Harlequin, the cheeky jester. The trail takes about 45 minutes to finish but can be completed in more than one visit. With safety in mind, it has been designed so that there is no need to go inside the venues.
When families scan each character’s unique QR code they’ll learn their names and what their role is in the carnival. Children will enjoy spotting the colourful characters in shop windows and engage by hearing the stories.
To create their ‘selfie storybooks’ families need to take funny selfies along the trail, with directions given, such as ‘look amazed’ or ‘look curious’. Once the trail is completed their selfies are embedded directly into the book pages as part of the story.
The book tells readers about the day their family went on a tour of the secret carnival, so they become stars of the story and get a keepsake.
Julie Bennett, chief operations for people and change management at City Culture Peterborough, said: “We are keenly aware that families will want to look for fun activities that are safe, socially distanced and contactless during the school half-term and this trail is the perfect activity for them to take part in. We’re grateful for the venues that have agreed to be part of the trail.
“Parents and carers are often stuck for things to do with children during holidays and this is a great way to get outdoors and explore all that our city centre has to offer. The trail is lots of fun and the digital storybook is an excellent reminder of how they became part of the secret carnival by successfully completing it.”
Martin Blackwell, national coordinator for the project, said: “We’ve ran several trails like these and have been blown away at the response considering the difficult climate on the high street. We had over 30,000 families play last year in over 200 locations. If something fun like this can help make families and kids feel good about going back out onto the high street in a safe way, then we’ve done our jobs.”
To find out more about the trail, visit www.secretcarnivaltrail.com