As a local I received a discount for my families admission. I was super excited and wanted to love it.
Plus Side.
Plenty of free parking.
Beautiful gardens.
Kid friendly.
Interactive hands on exhibits.
Friendly staff.
Boom Town was very insightful and fun to explore. My kids enjoyed the scale activity and picked up their souvenir gold in the gift shop.
Con.
The cost is high if your not using a discount. Everything is not included in the cost. The train ride, certain activities, select exhibits all require additional money to be shelled out.
Signage was either non existent or confusing. I spent a lot of time wandering around the same areas trying to find my way with the provided map. Very frustrating especially with little ones. We ended up not even making it to the adjoining museum because my kids were just tired from walking in circles.
We will definitely return, we saw was beautiful, hopefully now that more exhibits are open the experience will be better.