Exploration Place

300 N McLean Blvd, Wichita, KS 67203, USA

Address:	300 N McLean Blvd, Wichita, KS 67203, USA
Phone:	+1 316-660-0600
Site:	exploration.org
Rating:	4.3
Working:	10AM–5PM 10AM–5PM 10AM–5PM 10AM–5PM 10AM–5PM 10AM–5PM 12–5PM

Location

Photos 100

Reviews 8

Jen Voss

Our family loves going to Exploration Place! Our kiddos are two and four and there is plenty for them to do! The "castle" area is huge and often has older kids playing in it. Its adult- sized, though, so Im able to follow the kids around into the exhibit. Its got three levels to the castle area, so there is plenty of room to run and play. My kids like the Kansas Kids area the best. Its designed for children five and under, which keeps them from being run over by older kids. They have a market, hen house, air tunnels, climbing tree house area, even an infant circle. As a parent one of the things I love is that is enclosed with only one entrance. I can position myself there to ensure my kids cant escape and let them run and play. Other areas of Exploration Place will be gra when my kids get older and have more of an attention span. I like the airplane room and how it pertains to Wichita. The water exhibits, though small, are big hits with our kids. Finally, the miniature Kansas room is great, I especially love how is decorated for the holidays right now. A highly educational environment! Well worth the money of a membership if you live in Wichita! (Although a little pricey for a single day.)

Ben K

My kids LOVE Exploration Place, theyre always begging to go, and I always have a blast taking them. They do have some upkeep issues, but that hasnt seemed to dampen my kids love of the place. Weve even gone just to play with the Kiva blocks, or the "water sculptures" for an hour. Sometimes we barely get past the awesome ball bearing motorized sculpture in the foyer. But heres the big reason we can do that without complaining about whats in disrepair or the price: we have a membership. Its $75 per year for a family. With a family of four, go ten times in the next year and that boils down to $1.88 per person each visit. Go just twice and youre already saving money. If youve got a family of 8, well then youre saving money right out of the gate. And if you know youre getting in and out for that kind of scratch, it makes it easy to just stop by for an hour just like you would if you were going to the park, and you wont feel like you have to make the day of it. Its like an indoor, year-round, all weather playground with some other cool stuff to look at too. Dont let the haters keep you away, make this place a regular part of your family outings. Youll be glad you did.

Ashley Lawrence

Simply put-- WASTE OF TIME- I could do much better putting a set of blocks on a table and fashioning some boxes that make noise myself. . . $30.00 could have been put to much better use. My husband and I were very dissappointed. The place was poorly organized, with no logical flow. . . I will say, some of the interactive exhibits were neat, but most looked as though they had their heyday 25 years ago. Honestly, I think this place is in need of someone who has the time and money to make it what it should be-- a place with exhibits that are new; relevant to kids in the 21st century, and organized. This could be such a great place--- but for the lack of funds, lack of care, and time invested in giving this place what it needs to be worth the $30.00 for a family of 4. . . it was a sore disappointment, boring, and a waste of time. Someone-PLEASE- give this place the money and direction it needs; it COULD be amazing. . . but dont waste your time now.

Teresa Eggleston

We used the Exploration Place for the venue for the wedding of our youngest son and his new wife. With both of them living out of state I was in charge of making sure everything was in place. Would not recommend using this place for any event. The crew was not very helpful and even when told they would staff the walkway so people using it to walk/ride along river were advised to go around due to an event taking place, my sons and husband did the patrolling. Finally my husband had to go find the event coordinator to get staff out there. Just seems very unorganized and not very friendly. Also, some things that were told to us that would be available was not on day of event. For the money it cost not worth the headache. Also daughter in law requested to pay full bill upfront and they only ran payment for half leaving a balance to be owed once she got here which blew her wedding budget. Very dissatisfied.

James Aterton

I think its cursed. I was having a good day until I got there, and then promptly locked my keys in my car. Fortunately enough I was able to get them out with the help of a locksmith. However the day did not really improve. If you have a family with small kids, Im sure its an interesting place to visit. But as a single adult traveling alone, it is a bore. I wanted to get into the flight simulators and I couldnt, they were full of kids. I wanted to walk quietly through the hallways and observe the exhibits. I couldnt it was full of kids. This is a family-friendly facility, and for that reason I give it a high a rating as I do. It is not often that you find decent place to take family anymore. But unless you are interested in an IMAX movie , I actually do not recommend it.

John Randall

I used to love exploration place but my recent trip changed that. If you are looking for a fun place for the family just look forward to walking through a large building full of a bunch of broken or out of order exhibits. About half of ever display they have is broken or damaged in some way or another, and a lot of stuff just doesnt work at all. One of the exhibits they advertised wasnt even working! Now it is not all bad, there are some ,still working, exhibits that are really neat such as the miniature Kansas. But as of right now I wont be going back until they start actually maintaining there exhibits. Like the idea but the actual thing itself is just broken...

Jonathan Smith

Maybe fun for older kids but, it was a waste of money to me. Older kids were just running wild and almost knocked or hit into my 2 year old many times. The place didnt have much to see or do. Mostly puppet show areas, slides and puzzles. They did have a dedicated spot with a slide and some blocks and stuff, for children 5 and under to play in but, kids kept coming in that were older than 5 so we had the same issue in there. My daughter did enjoy the slide but, I felt we couldve had more fun at a park, for free. For $12.50 a ticket it just wasnt that great for us.

Matt Padgett

We paid for an annual family membership expecting to use it a lot. Honestly, due to the exhibits rarely changing, what they do have being constantly broke, rarely getting in new movies....ect, there is no way we used it enough to pay for the membership. We will not be renewing this year. In all honesty, a great place to visit 2-3 times a year. You would be able to hit all of the exhibit changes and all movies for the year, off of those 2-3 times. Seriously tho, they need to put in more effort into maintaining what they do have....