I have taken my 3 sons there most every year during our yearly visits.
Where –
The Museum is located in the Arts & Science District, across from Riverwalk's Esplanade Park and the Broward Center for the Performing Arts in downtown Fort Lauderdale.
It’s a quiet commercial area of town, seems pretty safe. Only saw one bum camping out near there over several years.
Who –
The web site doesn’t really mention this, but I wouldn’t recommend this for small children. Only a small portion is set up for small kids 7 and under. They also might not like the IMAX. You could take small kids, just don’t expect them to have the stamina to make a full visit, bring the stroller so they can nap.
Directions –
I recommend using a computer mapping program, and map to this address: 401 SW Second Street, Fort Lauderdale FL 33312 Watch for the brightly colored Blockbuster Imax sign, it can be seen for a block or two.
The street naming and layout around Ft Lauderdale is a little confusing to me, there is more than one 2nd, one is a St the other an Ave, and it depends on whether it’s a N/S or E/W for the name. It’s easy to turn on the wrong street.
Best way to get there is ride the trolley, it will take you right past there for $0.50 per ride, versus $7.00 parking at MODS)
Parking –
Use the parking garage across 5th Ave, the meters are often taken, and don’t give you enough time anyway. The meters are good for a gift shop only visit, more on that later.
There are both permanent and visiting exhibits.
Food –
They have a Subway / snack shop with all the usual items, my boys liked the big pretzels and Subway sandwiches. We sat outside by the clock and ate. There are usually pigeons begging for scraps much to my boys delight. You could also pack a lunch to save money.
General –
This is a museum for children. If you don’t like to be around a bunch of children having a good time, might want to skip this one. It’s not as bad as Chucky Cheese, but there are tour groups of children and they can get noisy. If you want to max your enjoyment of the exhibits, try to pace through either before or after big tour groups of kids. Or tour in opposite order they do, that worked best for us. Also, later in the evening the school groups leave, and suddenly it seems like you have the place to yourself. The friendly staff are mainly there to keep order and give directions, don’t expect them to be expert tour guides. The staff in the Gizmo area were helpful at showing how to solve some of the very tricky puzzles.
Permanent Exhibits
Runways to Rockets: Our Place in Aerospace
There were interactive exhibits like a ride in a Mars Rover, where you are on a mission and have to complete the mission and make it back to base before running out of fuel. It’s one of those computerized rides that moves a big fiberglass shuttle with hydraulics. This was very fun for everyone. The exhibit where you sit in a chair on a boom and simulate being an astronaut fixing a satellite was fun for the boys, adults were too heavy to get on this one.
GREAT GRAVITY CLOCK –
At 52-feet tall, the Great Gravity Clock is the biggest kinetic energy sculpture in Florida. Located in the Museum's Grand Atrium, this unique timepiece is one of only three in the world! The other two are in Mexico and Japan.
This reminds me of a huge Rube Goldberg machine, or hamster playground. We all found this entertaining, watching the balls rolling on tracks, spiraling down looped baskets, and it does work. I checked against my watch and it keeps time.
Florida Ecoscapes –
We enjoyed the exhibits of fish aquariums, sharks, alligators, but the turtles were the star of that exhibit.
Living in the Everglades –
The Everglades, or River of Grass as the Native Americans called it, is a fragile ecosystem that demonstrates the delicate balance within nature and the threats from humankind. My boys loved the fish, turtles, and they even had a alligator they were letting kids touch.
Discovery Center –
Children -up to age 7, and their caregivers share in the joy of learning and discovery together in this brand new exhibition.
Although my boys were too old to enjoy this section, they looked in there and did like it, I think there were some big building blocks they liked.
Sound –
Experience a symphony of light and sound in a giant musical Kaleidoscope.
Gizmo City –
Lift a 300-pound engine, program a robot, and discover some of the simple, universal concepts behind today's technology.
They did like lifting the engine block and other mostly interactive exhibits, but the interactive display that showed how energy is created and consumed was a huge hit, they would have played with that for hours if I let them.
Aviation Station –
There were displays set up demonstrating different aspects of flight, from a cockpit of a DC9 to the passenger section of an Emberair airliner.
There were several different flight simulators for everything from a fighter to a large commercial airliner. One display let them put Styrofoam wings on and get in front of a large fan so they could actually feel lift. This is the best aviation display I have seen, and it may not be completed yet.
DinoMight!
Opens May 26, 2007 - September 9, 2007
Experience life as it was during the Cretaceous period with eleven animatronic dinosaurs that lived on land, in the air and in the sea. The animatronic dinosaurs were very cool, but my boys liked digging for dinosaur bones in the trough best – go figure.
Other –
There was a machine that pressed designs onto pennies, make sure to take some pennies and quarters for this. There was also a machine that makes a dinosaur out of wax while you watch.
IMAX™ Theater -
The 300-seat Blockbuster™ IMAX™ Theater located in downtown Ft Lauderdale features a 60-ft. x 80-ft. screen and a 15,000-watt digital sound system that delivers six discrete channels of clear sound through 42 speakers. The IMAX™ projector's 15,000-watt Xenon bulb projects images of unsurpassed brilliance and clarity onto the five-story-high screen. The steeply sloped cinema seats bring the audience closer to the screen, so that the size of the image dominates your peripheral vision.
The first thing that strikes you when you walk into the theater is how steep the seating is. In fact, if you are very afraid of heights, you might want to skip the theater!
On a couple of visits we sat near the front, and the sound seemed too loud, I would recommend sitting near the back. The screen is all they claim, huge and bright. The old goggles could be hard for little kids to adjust and wear, they have been replaced with big “sunglasses” that are easy to use. And they work good, if the movie has things that are floating or flying near the camera, it really seems like it’s right in front of you. If you are watching a movie with a lot of movement, you may start feeling nauseous, close your eyes for a minute, that helped me.
Explore Store a.k.a. gift shop
When you visit us at the museum, don't miss the store!
They sell the store short in the description, it’s one of the nicest for those into science, nearly as nice, but no where near as big, as the one at NASA. This is one of our boys favorite parts of the visit, in fact we have made return trips to just the gift shop to get unique toys.
The merchandise isn’t cheap, but much of it we haven’t seen elsewhere.
Some of their favorite finds were crystal growing kits, astronaut ice cream, toy astronauts, pool toys, robot alarm clock and of coarse rock candy on a stick. Some of the robot and astronaut toys even NASA didn’t have. There’s also a convenience store within a block of there if you need it..
Overall –
This is a fun and educational place for families to visit. Lots of fun and education at a good value, use coupons from Beach Bucks or Entertainment Book or MODS flier to reduce admission price.price.
This review is the subjective opinion of a TripAdvisor member and not of TripAdvisor LLC.
