One of Swindon's more unique events is back this year with a whole host of things for families to do this half term.

The Festival of Tomorrow is a multi-day science festival that has been a fixture in the town's calendar for a number of years and this year has its largest programme of events yet.

There are several things that Swindon families can take part in or go and see as part of the festival during the school holidays without costing them a penny.

At STEAM, Museum of the Great Western Railway

From Monday to Saturday, 10am to 5pm, and Sunday February 18 10am to 4pm, a nine-meter-long inflatable robotic snail called Luma will meet museum visitors and offer a variety of different experiences including drop-in activities and live shows.

Every hour from 11am to 4pm on Tuesday, Dr Sarah Bearchell will be hosting her Amazing Air interactive show where everyone joins in the multi-sensory experiments to gather proof that air really is there.

And every hour the day after The Cloud Factory will be creating clouds that everyone can touch, see, hear, smell and taste.

On Thursday there are Fun Science Shows running every 30 minutes between 11.30am and 2.30pm featuring 'hair raising live demonstrations and experiments'.

On Friday children can have a go at building a robot racer or make their own snail slime to take home.

And over the weekend, there will be the Super Sonic Science Show between 11am and 3.30pm.

At the Swindon Designer Outlet

Swindon Advertiser: An animatronic turtle will be roaming around The MacArthur Glen Designer Outlet in SwindonAn animatronic turtle will be roaming around The MacArthur Glen Designer Outlet in Swindon (Image: Festival of Tomorow)From 11am to 3pm until Friday 16, Zelva, the animatronic giant tortoise will be at the Swindon Designer Outlet. Zelva has been designed and built by The Flying Buttresses, who have lent their making talents to films such as Prometheus, Guardians of the Galaxy and Artemis Fowl.

From Monday to Wednesday, 10am-4pm, and Thursday, 11am - 4pm, Neon Dance will be presenting a nature-themed robotic exhibition and installation in collaboration with Bristol Robotics Lab. people can meet and interact with the robots.

And on Wednesday, 11am-3pm, the University of Bristol’s Trustworthy Autonomous Systems researchers will be doing robot demos and and answering questions from the public.

Finally, there is an Augmented Reality Space Trail at the Outlet with people able to scan a QR code on their phone to see hidden models come to life.

At The Deanery CE Academy

The festival finale takes place on Friday and Saturday, from 10am-5pm. Families can see everything from the latest e-sports gaming kit, racing model hydrogen cars, to arts and crafts and live demonstrations.