I've done pretty much everything within driving distance for a daytrip in Southern New England. When my son was young, when sports and fishing didn't get in the way, I took him to every zoo, historical site, and nature preserve I knew of. By the time he was ten we had done Battleship Cove, Roger Williams Zoo, and the Freedom Trail enough times that we were a little bored. I brought him to museums and aquariums, but one place that always eluded me was the Ecotarium in Worcester.
The Ecotarium, formerly known as the New England Science Center, is a part museum of science part zoo. There aren't many animals and most of them are local. At the Eco (I can not keep writing Ecotarium over and over, so from now on it's Eco) there are Wood Turtles, Box Turtles, Owls, Eagle, and River Otters. There are a few others.
There are a lot of hands on activities much of it directed toward kids. The most fun thing I found was a wind tunnel. You get in and close the door and wind hits you up to seventy eight miles per hour. The wind tunnel is in an area about Mt Washington's climate. There are exhibits explaining how difficult it is for vegetation at that altitude.
There's a lot of other interesting stuff to learn about. There is a collection of shells you could find in New England. There is a section about Africa with stuffed wild animals. Outside, there are life sized dinosaurs. Also outside is a place where you can learn about bubbles. You can make huge bubbles and bubbles of many shapes. I thought that was fun.
There is a train that goes around the property but it was closed for maintenance the day we went. For kids, there is a playground along a tiny stream where we saw a bullfrog. On the trail past the playground were a Mountain Lion and in another large cage, Ravens. The Puma's were awake. The Ravens were bouncing around eating and watching us.
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| A meteorite that you can touch |
The Eco also has a planetarium and I am a sucker for a planetarium program. We went to the 2 o'clock which was about the size of the universe. There are different programs throughout the day. Unfortunately, since much of the Eco is dedicated to kids, there were a lot of kids in the program, and some of them were obnoxious. Still, the program itself was interesting. There is an additional fee of seven dollars to go into the planetarium program.
The price for an adult was $19. I have to admit it was worth it. I enjoyed the animals the best of course. I have never seen a Wood Turtle. So it was nice to see what I am looking for. We spent fifteen minutes watching the Otters. I did read a lot of the literature on the walls and learned a lot. If you have kids, there is a lot of activities to do. I actually ran into my sister-in-law and my niece and they were having a great time. Ironically, they had never been there before either.
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| Mineral Display |
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| Entrance to the exhibit about Africa |
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| A short program about Eastern Box Turtles |
