Exploratorium

Is there a science to skateboarding? Do toilets really flush counterclockwise in Australia? Find answers to questions you wished you'd learned in school, at San Francisco's thrilling hands-on science museum. Combining science with art, and investigating human perception, the Exploratorium nudges you to question how you perceive the world around you. The setting is thrilling – a nine-acre, glass-walled pier jutting straight into San Francisco Bay, with large outdoor portions you can explore free of charge, twenty-four hours a day. Covering a whopping 330,000 sq feet of indoor-outdoor space, galleries focus on color, sound, light and motion, stimulating learning by inviting participation. Never didactic, always engaging, the over-600 exhibits have buttons to push, cranks to ratchet, and dials to adjust, all tinkered together by artists and scientists at the in-house building shop (which you can peer into). Try on a punk hairdo, courtesy of the static-electricity station. Turn your body into the gnomon of a sun-dial. Slide, climb and feel your way – in total darkness – through the labyrinth of the thrilling Tactile Dome (reservations and separate ticket required).more info:lonelyplanet

source:Christina Xu

Exploratorium Park - SF

source:lj16

Outside the Exploratorium 3

source:Bruce Harlick

Exploratorium

source:Jennifer Morrow

Exploratorium

source:Tim Bartel