A friend recommended the Ibaraki Nature Museum and she was right to recommend – it was such a cool (and inexpensive) day out.
This is a few hours out of Tokyo.
It’s definitely designed with young people in mind as almost every exhibit moves or is touchable and/or interactive.
For a change, it was lovely to visit a museum and adjoining gardens that hadn’t gone for a cheesy option (no dinosaur shaped ice-creams or kids trains chugging around the park). I got the sense that this facility is built with education and preservation in mind.
I love the museum’s large building. It has high ceilings and large windows showing all the greenery of the museum’s surrounding gardens. You can really tell that you are out of the city.
There are arrows clearly marked throughout the whole museum with the suggested route which made it really easy for my kiddies to keep moving without missing anything.
The highlight was, without a doubt, the moving and roaring dinosaur exhibit.
My only criticism is, although their English website and museum pamphlet are in English, the actual exhibit descriptions are all in Japanese so if you’re children are of a literate age this might be a bit frustrating ( or you might be giving your google translate a severe workout!)
There are breastfeeding spaces, change tables and water fountains all throughout the museum.
I recommend taking your own lunch and snacks as the museum cafeteria (tonkatsu, noodle dishes, pancakes etc.) had a long line – and that was on a weekday.
After the museum, you can start exploring the gardens out the back. Just near the garden entrance is a visual key with a set of pictures of the kinds of bugs and flowers to keep an eye out for.
The Bamboo Grass Forest was also small but very picturesque.
It was 37 degrees when we visited so we decided to make a beeline for the mizunohiroba 水の広場 (in the English pamphlet it is referred to as the “Water Square”)
I did enjoy how casual this area it was. I had brought towels and swimwear (and mosquito repellent – thank goodness!) and kiddies were all just changing out of clothes to swimwear at the seats next to the man-made brook. If you live here you’ll know that this informal set up is definitely not the ‘norm.’
The photos make it look like the kids are sliding but actually it was more like a flat slide and they had to worm their way down the hill. It was very, very clean and all felt very safe. There was lots and lots of shade.
My only regret was only taking my single stroller as it was a very, very, very hot 10 minute walk to get to the water area – a bit much to ask of my 4 year old (and of me! I wanted to jump in that water too!)
IBARAKI NATURE MUSEUM
茨城県坂東市大崎700
700 OSAKI, BANDO, IBARAKI PREFECTURE
OPEN: 9:30AM-5PM
CLOSED: MONDAYS (TUESDAYS IF MONDAY IS A NATIONAL HOLIDAY *the calendar on their English website is very comprehensive so just take a look before heading out.
ADMISSION: ADULTS 740 YEN, HIGH SCHOOL & UNI STUDENTS 430 YEN, ELEMENTARY SCHOOL STUDENTS 150 YEN *prices are even cheaper if you decide to skip the museum and go straight for the outdoor facilities
IBARAKI NATURE MUSEUM
If, like us, you love great museums for kids – check out My Favourite Museums for Kids in Japan here.
