Family-friendly Fun at Tūhura Otago Museum
Kate Oktay, Wild Dunedin — Jan 17, 2024
When it comes to family fun in Dunedin, look no further than Tūhura Otago Museum! New Zealand’s biggest science centre, eight free galleries, the only 3D planetarium in Australasia and an ever-changing array of events, workshops, talks, and family activities are all at Otago Southland’s most visited institution.
Tūhura Otago Museum was established over 150 years ago during Otago’s gold rush. Formed at a time when Dunedin was New Zealand’s largest city, its collection is much larger than you would expect. Over 1.5 million objects and taoka are homed within its walls, spanning nature, culture, and science, telling the stories of Otago, Aotearoa New Zealand, and the world.
Tūhura is home to New Zealand’s largest fossil, a plesiosaur, the largest collection of southern Māori taoka, a world-class Pasifika collection, and, Dunedin’s favourite gallery, Animal Attic, a vast collection of Victorian taxidermy telling the story of Darwin’s theory of evolution.
If you are a nature lover, you will love Tūhura Otago Museum! If you can’t get out to the penguins, albatross, seals, and sea lions, or you don’t want to brave our southern weather, come and see them in the Nature Gallery. It is full of the creatures of Otago, both past and present.
Located in a beautiful historic building with soaring atriums and surprises around every corner, Tūhura Otago Museum offers free guided tours daily.
Alongside the various free galleries, Tūhura also has New Zealand’s largest science centre. The Tūhura Science Centre is hours of fun for families, with a three-storey indoor slide, a bike-riding skeleton, and 43 other hands-on interactives that awaken wonder and curiosity, and reveal the science in everything that surrounds us.
A highlight of the Science Centre is a Tropical Forest filled with hundreds of live exotic butterflies, a three-storey waterfall, and a sky bridge. Kept to the humidity and warmth of a tropical rainforest, it’s the hottest place in Dunedin.
The Tūhura Science Centre is the only bicultural science centre in the world, telling the Kai Tahu creation story and integrating art with science. It is a place to discover, learn, and play.
Every day the Perpetual Guardian Planetarium hosts live shows and screenings for children and adults. From children’s shows, where we turn the theatre into a rocket ship and blast off to space; to their Live Space Tour where you can see the constellations in the Otago sky on the night of your visit, to family-friendly films and popular animations, there is always something on.
Share your secrets with friends across the Museum Reserve. Image by Isabella Harrex.
Learn more at otagomuseum.nz
SUMMARY:
You'll need at least a couple of hours to explore Tūhura Otago Museum's collections, and longer to experience the Planetarium and Science Centre as well.
To get there: Tūhura Otago Museum is located in the centre of Dunedin at 419 Great King St. Get directions.
