Add visiting The Children’s Museum of Tucson to your things-to-do list right now. Done? Ok, now let me tell you how much fun we had here. First of all, there are two locations, Oro Valley and Downtown Tucson, this is downtown Tucson. We planned to spend the morning here, and I had to drag the kids out to make it to our dinner date that evening!
Curiosity Courtyard
You can drum on some drums, blow bubbles, plant a garden, dig on an excavator, race a car, swing on a giant swing, climb on a tractor, play on the playground, and more outside in front of the museum.
Water Wednesday is included with your admission over the summer, whether you get soaked, or just run through to cool off.
Public Safety
Let’s face it, we all want to slide down a firehouse pole to drive a firetruck, see the back of an ambulance and ride on a police motorcycle. This area lets you live out the best parts of all public safety jobs.
Electricity
All about energy, electricity and solar power. There is a car to learn about how electric cars work and activities to see how much power you can conduct.
Imagine It
Imagine It! is the creative heart of the Museum where we spent many hours. One kid is building a car on one end, the other drawing on the walls. Don’t worry, you paint, they clean it up. There is a whole tool table and wall of recycled materials to turn into art as well.
Sense of Place
Take a tour around Tucson, from Sabino Canyon to Sentinel Peak, with stops at Colossal Cave and Kitt Peak along the way. Scale the heights of Sabino, discover creatures in the cave and view the heavens in the Kitt Peak telescope. Explore the inside of a saguaro, then top it off with a photo op in front of “A” Mountain – all in one room! Watch out for that monsoon rolling in and those animals flying off the cactus. Don’t forget to do a little gold mining while on your Tucson tour.
Whistle Stop
When you enter you will notice the giant play train, train table, engineer costumes, and signs. Don’t forget to look up and the train circling the room with the Tucson background. I want this in my own house. Don’t forget to honk the horn and ring the bell on the train.
Pet Vet
This was probably my favorite room, maybe it’s because the kids took turns playing the vet and also climbing in the cages and bringing the animals while I was the vet. You can weigh, x-ray, shampoo, dry, and even look under the microscope to see what is wrong with the animals.
Market
From the local milk producer and apple trees to the grocery store to the local cafe, this is basically the ultimate play kitchen. We worked on picking certain foods by the letters they start with, as well as a category they fall into. Then the kids would take turns ringing each other up and talking about how expensive each item was. Then we went to the giant kitchen and cooked dinner. If only it was this much fun in real life!
Wee World
For the youngest visitors, they recently expanded this area. Kids 5 and younger are allowed to play here. There is stroller parking here which I wish people had taken more advantage of. You can put on a play, take care of the babies, try on a costume, play with musical flowers, climb and explore the Luckey Leaf or sit quietly in the reading corner.
The Children’s Museum of Tucson
Gravity
Learn how everything that goes up, must come down! We had fun building and rebuilding this creation as well as figuring out how to get the ball to go back up.
Parking
I parked on the street next to the museum. I only saw 2-hour parking, so we ran out a couple of times and added more money to the meter. If you have the app, you can easily get reminders that your time is almost up and add them from your phone so you never have to leave.
The Children’s Museum of Tucson
200 South 6th Avenue
Tucson, AZ 85701
AND
11015 North Oracle Road
Oro Valley, AZ 85737
