Costa Rica Childrens Museum

If you have kids, a day trip might be a fun diversion while in San Jose.
Or, visit it, camera in hand, on your Costa Rica vacation even without your kids.

Originally opened in 1909, its deplorable conditions led it to be called the "shame of Costa Rica" until it was closed 70 years later.

It sat, abandoned, for more than a decade until a former Costa Rica First Lady, Gloria Bejarano de Calderón, created a foundation called Ayudanos para Ayudar (lit. “Help us in order to help”) and the old prison was transformed into a museum under the premise that it's better to "educate the child, not to punish the man."

There are 32 rooms in the Costa Rica Children's Museum, some of which offer interactive exhibits where visitors can experience the tremors of an earthquake, see a robot of Costa Rica's first NASA astronaut (physicist Franklin Chang who holds the record for most Space Shuttle missions), direct a digital orchestra, and even travel back in time in Costa Rica's history.

And, unsurprisingly in a country awarded the 2010 Future Policy Award by the United Nations, there are exhibits designed to heighten awareness of, and appreciation for, conservation, recycling, and preserving bio-diversity.

Tel. (506) 2258-4929

Address: San Jose. 4th Street, north of 9th avenue

Admission fees: Adults ¢1,100.00 (app. $2.50). Children ¢800.00 ($1.50).

Opening hours:

Tuesdays to Fridays, 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Saturdays and Sundays 9:30am to 5:00pm.

Closed Mondays

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