San Francisco With Kids - Best Attractions in Bay Area

Tilden Park - Berkeley

Little Farm is an interactive farm where kids can pet and feed animals ranging from goats to chickens and rabbits. The animals are enclosed in pens and barns, but if you bring celery and lettuce, you can entice them to the fence for a snack and a pat on the head.

The setting of Little Farm couldn't be more pretty, with the surrounding hills and trees of Tilden Park's Nature Area. The Jewel Lake trail nearby provides an additional way to burn off energy, in a relatively easy, one-mile hike around the lake.

Oakland - Golf Links Road off I-580

Oakland Zoo has moved toward a more habitat-conscious facility since it's earlier days in the Oakland Hills. Although a small zoo, most of the animal enclosures have natural appointments, trees, and terrain that seems conducive to the animals' well-being, as opposed to just serving as "exhibit space."

The Children's Zoo is a broad expanse of greenery, with an enclosed farm area, as well as fascinating fruit bat house, and playful Ring-tailed Lemurs housed just above the gardens.

Oakland Zoo
9777 Golf Links Road
Oakland, CA 94605
Tel: (510) 632-9525
Oakland Zoo Website

Oakland Hills

The Chabot Space and Science Center offers education of the planetary kind. Kids can learn about our solar system through interactive quizes and hand-on displays. There's a planetarium with a full-dome digital projection system, a Megadome Theater showing rotating films, and free telescope viewings on Friday and Saturday nights, from dusk until closing (weather permitting).

The views from Chabot are panoramic, situated as it is, high in the hills of Oakland. Older kids might enjoy a hike on some of the surrounding trails, as part of a day's excursion.

10000 Skyline Boulevard
Oakland, CA 94619
Telephone: (510) 336-7300

Walnut Creek

Set in the rolling hills of the East Bay, Lindsay Wildlife is an acclaimed wildlife rehabilitation center and museum. Children can learn about native wild animals, and explore hands-on science exhibits.

Lindsay is a short drive or BART ride from downtown. A visit to the museum promises close encounters with hawks, snakes and even a mountain lion -- all of whom could not be returned to the wild.

Note: The adjacent hospital is not open to visitors, but accepts found injured or orphaned wild animals.

1931 First Avenue
Walnut Creek, CA USA 94597
(925) 935-1978
Directions to Lindsay

Author volunteers in the wildlife rehabilitation hospital located at Lindsay Wildlife Museum

Fremont

Ardenwood Historic Farm is a 19th century estate as well as a working farm. (It's listed on the National Register of Historic Places.)

Activities at the farm include:

• Close encounters with various farm animals (sheep, pigs, turkeys, chickens, rabbits, goats, and cows
• Arden Station and Deer Park Station - Horse-drawn train takes kids on a ride into the park with docents dressed in period costumes
• Ardenwood Forge with blacksmith demonstrations
• Visit the 19th century Patterson House (home of estate owner George Washington Patterson)
• Special holiday and seasonal events: pumpkin patch and corn maize (Halloween), Ardenwood Victorian Christmas celebration

34600 Ardenwood Blvd
Fremont, CA 94555
Telephone: (510) 796-0199

San Mateo

Just south of SFO in San Mateo, the highlight of a trip to the Coyote Point Museum is the animal feedings. Like Lindsay, Coyote Point has live animals that could not be released to the wild. As a result, you can be there for river otter feedings, fox feedings and other wildlife presentations. The permanent displays outdoors house the resident animals, including golden eagles and a coyote.

Indoors, the Coyote Point Museum has an beautiful exhibit hall, divided into sections about habitat, earth science, and environmental issues.

1651 Coyote Point Drive
San Mateo, CA USA 94401
(650) 342-7755
Directions to Coyote Point