The Babble List: 21 Delightfully Weird Family Vacations
Skip the beach and hit the bug petting zoo!
by Christina Couch
June 25, 2009
15.
Insectropolis, Toms River, New Jersey
Many zoos and museums offer insect exhibits, but only one combines the beauty of bugs with the terror of prison. At Insectropolis' permanent Rock State Prison exhibit, children learn first-hand just how many bugs out there can kill them. Divided into categories
like "Six-Armed Bandits" and "Mass Murderers," the exhibit presents kids with dossiers of villain bugs that are dangerous to humans. The upside to surviving Rock State Prison is that it makes Insectropolis' bug petting zoo (featuring Rosie the Touchable Tarantula)
a little less scary. Tickets are $7.
14.
Museum of Questionable Medical Devices, St. Paul, Minnesota
Located within the Science Museum of Minnesota, this collection pays homage to medical forms of fraud, quackery, deception and deceit. Featuring devices ranging from the Foot-Powered Breast Enlarger to the McGregor Rejuvenator, a contraption that used magnetism,
UV and infrared rays to supposedly reverse the aging process, this hands-on collection allows kids to try on fake medical equipment and take pot shots at past generations. Tickets are $11 for adults, $8.50 for kids.
13.
Metropolis, Illinois
Sure, there hasn't been a good Superman movie since the '80s, but that hasn't stopped the citizens of Metropolis — the only town in the world dedicated to the Man of Steel — from placing a fifteen-foot statue of the superhero in the middle of town, as well as a
Super Museum. Metropolis'
Superman Celebration 2009 (June 11th through 14th, 2009), the largest Superman-themed event in the country, will feature an array of comic book authors, celebrity guests, a Superman Fan baseball game (Metropolis Marvels vs. Smallville Meteors), video and musical tributes and not one,
but several Superman-themed game shows.
12.
Aircraft Boneyard, Tucson, Arizona
Located literally around the Pima Air and Space Museum on the Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, the 309 Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Group — better known as the Aircraft Bone Yard — features seventy-five acres of aircrafts and aerospace vehicles currently being
reserviced, regenerated or stripped for parts by the U.S. Air Force. The three to four-hour "Boneyard Tour" takes families through 4,400 piloted machines from the Air Force, Navy-Marine Corps, Army, Coast Guard and NASA. Tickets for the Pima Museum are
$15 for adults, $9 for kids ages seven to twelve. Boneyard tour tickets are $7 per person.
11.
International UFO Museum and Research Center,
Roswell, New Mexico
Dedicated to all things alien, this tiny museum explores what happened in the 1947 Roswell UFO incident, as well as the history of "human contact with aliens," including crop circles and testimony from UFO abductees. The on-site research
library lets future alien hunters dig deeper into the paranormal. Tickets are $5 for adults, $2 for kids.
©2009 Babble
About the Author
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Christina Couch is a freelance writer based in Richmond, VA, and Chicago, IL. She is the author of Virginia Colleges 101 (Palari Publishing, 2008). Her work can also be found in Playboy.com, Time Out Chicago, Wired magazine, MSN.com and Yahoo! Finance. |
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