Fernbank Science Center

Recently we visited the Fernbank Science Center, which is not the same as the Fernbank Natural History Museum.  It is much (and I mean MUCH) smaller and (as my kids pointed out) has no children's play area.  Still, they have a planetarium and this was a GCA field trip with our online school, so we went.

The kids loved the planetarium.  We saw a movie about planets, the sun, stars, the constellations, and asteroids.  Very cool.  Catherine literally recognized (audibly) every planet before the narrator said the name.  About ten minutes into the movie, Sabrina turned to me and, at typical "Sabrina volume," announced "This is so cool, Mommy!  They put the movie on the ceiling!  Can you believe it?"

Here are the girls in front of the splash-down capsule:

Sabrina loved the enormous dinosaur heads:

Catherine stuck her hand in the stuffed alligator:

The snakes were all in cages, so we could not pet them.  The girls were disappointed; I was not.

This is a bad picture of Catherine, but she is standing next to a big globe of Mars:

The Center had lots (and I mean lots) of stuffed birds.  Here is Catherine looking at some birds of prey:

My assessment:  The Fernbank Science Center is free and I can barely recommend it.  I was glad that we went with a field trip and were thus treated to the planetarium show, which was great.  But the museum itself has few exhibits, none of which are really spectacular.  They do have a lot of classrooms and I am sure offer great programs.  I am a museum junkie and love all museums.  The girls loved that it was a field trip and they got out of the house.