In Utah we have a ZAP tax that goes to support the zoo, arts, and parks. That means that every quarter we have a free day at the Museum of Natural History. There are also free zoo days (but they are all in the middle of the winter) and free days at some of the other venues.These taxes allowed the museum to totally rebuild and move to a new and amazing building a few years ago. Honestly, their normal prices are out of my range, so we try to keep the free days on our radar. Last week I got online and signed us all up to attend the 12:00 time-slot.
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| Look how big those dinosaurs are! |
We also invited Grandpa to join us. Bossy's family was still in Texas (I'm trying to get her to post about that) and Princess had some girls coming to the house from her Girls' Camp tent group, so she wasn't with us either. We arrived right about 12:00, but we couldn't find a parking space. Then the awesome guy directing traffic allowed us to park our big van at Red Butte Gardens. I think their parking lot was just as close as the museum's lot.
We were expecting bigger crowds, but it wasn't too bad and we had plenty of time to spend in our favorite places. Baby Doll was a little nervous about all the big dinosaur bones, but she got over it quickly when we let her dig in the sand to uncover some bones. Crafty loved the area where she stepped on the floor and the color changed. Sport loved putting his hand on the fingerprint wall to capture the heat and pressure. Scout was excited about the sand table, and Curly loved everything! He's just that kind of guy.
Drama Queen loved walking on the glass floors and looking down at the fossils displayed about 3 feet down. Grandpa's favorite part was the rattlesnake and I think he took each kid over there separately to let them see it. Baby Doll really liked the ant farm and the dioramas with the animals in them. And Prima Donna's favorite part was building up the little houses and shaking them down like an earthquake.I just liked watching all the kids discover things together.
I need to figure out if some of our museums have free days, or if any offer discounts to usaa employees. We need to start touring San Antonio more! I love how good you are at finding fun, free things for your gang to do!
ReplyDeleteThe Zoo in Portland which is closest to our home is outrageous so when we travel to Seattle Washington we go for free..we are older than dirt now and the attactions in the emerald city Seattle are the best, for little money one can get an Orca pass because we are 65 and older we can ride the finest transportation system for little money if at all, we missed living there because I could not get full time employment, but we are considering a place outside of seattle and enjoying our retirement years, either that or Austin, TX where our only will live soon, it is about 80 and dry all the live long year there, friendly people low prices on everything and sunshine & nice loving of their God, families and newcomers, we shall see.enjoy your blog, always read it first thing in the mornings it makes my day and weeks so happy, if others could take their responsibilities about being a wonderful Mother and Father and loving the Lord the juvenile justice centers would be empty!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteAwesome adventure! We were going to take our grandchildren there over the 4th but didn't get a chance to do it.
ReplyDeleteWe have another family of grandchildren coming in August. I will diffidently want to take them there.
Blessings!