Visited on school trip. When we arrived, staff were waiting outside and grabbed our attention by…read moretheir traditional 1700's Quaker attire. Our tour consisted of the Blacksmith, Pond Life, Mill Tour, Miller's House and Hearth Cooking. I must admit I think the adults were a bit more intrigued by the program than the children. I specifically loved the Blacksmith demonstration. The gentleman showed us how tedious it was just to make a simple spoon and the amount of work that went into making items out of iron during this time frame. He explained that during this time 8-9 year olds would have been working on making nails and how important the Blacksmith was to the community. I would love to visit again and participate in learning more about the process. I not a bug lover so the Pond while the children thought it was cool to play in, I would pass. The Mill tour.. amazing the process of milling flour and the Miller's house displayed how the home would have been set up during the time period, including the brick oven. I also enjoyed the Hearth cooking.. the children learned how to make and "cook" cookies outside in a Hearth; the cookies actually tasted pretty good. Overall, I really enjoyed my time on the grounds. I look forward to returning and participating in another programs.

Group of us ventured over from our hotel to hike around this beutiful property. Picturesque…read morescenery and trails. Really enjoyed exploring. We were a group of 20 with ages ranging from 9 - 50 something. Great place for a picnic and to take pictures. Gristmill and house is a worthwhile visit.

We were visiting from out of town and decided to stop here for a fun activity to do with my kids (9…read more& 6). They were loving all the exhibits and thought the snakes were so cool. We enjoyed the interactive activities. The kids enjoyed the nature nook where we stamped with mushrooms for an art activity. However we were told the sandbox experience started at 2:30 and when we got there at 2:28 the guy wasn't exactly kind about it or understanding. The kids were sad they didn't get the full experience. It was much smaller than expected though for the price you pay. Probably wouldn't go back but we did have a good time.

It's considered traditional to celebrate Independence Day at a parade, or a barbecue, or a picnic,…read morefollowed by watching fireworks, right? Well, Lion and I must be non traditional folk, because we visited the Delaware Museum of Nature. It was wonderful. The museum is one of those place I've driven by so many times, thinking - hey, really should go there sometime. Just .... didn't. On a broiling hot 4th of July, when the last thing we wanted to do was barbecue or go to a parade, we saw it was open and decided this was our opportunity. Yay! We arrived to a mostly empty museum, with a group of volunteers and staff who were really great! Being in the museum without crowds was lively. I could spend as much or as little time as I wanted with an exhibit. Volunteers demonstrating various artifacts were friendly Jan helpful. We got to meet two different snakes, learn that turtles can actually move quite fast and can climb trees, and learned that after the passing of Dude, the Museum Cat, they gave a new cat in training. Rye exhibits were nicely curated. This museum is not expansive, however they use their space well, focusing on aspects of Delaware's ecology and history. There's a family/kid nature "lab" where people can explore hands in nature. Parking is free in their private lot. It's an open, airy space that is fully accessible. I think we may have started outrun own new tradition this year.

What a cool hidden gem in Valley Forge National Park! I took a tour of this museum in November…read more2025. Our tour guide was knowledgeable and intriguing as he guided us around the property and inside the home/studio. Esherick was extremely talented and it was incredible to see his stunning creations. Tips: The tour is inside and outside so dress accordingly. There are steps inside the building. Booking ahead is required and tour group counts are limited.

Visiting the Wharton Esherick Museum in Malvern had been on my to do list for a while, but the…read moretours sell out, and I've missed out on visiting a couple of times! Last week, I planned a last minute day trip to the Philadelphia area and noticed that they had exactly four tickets still open on tours for the rest of the month and they were for the upcoming Saturday at 11am. It was a sign, and I jumped on buying those tickets. How to explain the Wharton Esherick Museum?! Wharton Esherick was an American artist and designer (he's best known for his modernist wood furniture), and - while not a trained architect - he designed this house and studio compound (of four separate buildings) in Malvern to live and work in. By the time he was adding a workshop to the compound in 1955, building codes had made their way into law and Esherick got help from none other than Louis Kahn to help design that building. So what will you see if you visit? Just an incredible home and studio. Esherick was not into straight lines or right angles or wasting perfectly good wood, so the house and studio is an amazing sight: that staircase! the wood floor in the dining room! the concrete extension painted in colors that blend into the natural surroundings! the art and furniture pieces of Esherick's shown throughout the house! It's a hard place to describe, but our tour guide did a marvelous job of teaching us about Esherick and the buildings during our tour, while sharing some woodworking facts and passion, too! Reservations for the tours are required, and they do sell out. Regularly. There's an exhibit on Esherick at the Brandywine right now, and that might be generating more interest than usual in seeing his home and studio - or maybe tours of this amazing place are always this popular?! We did the Experiencing Esherick Tour, which takes you into the home and studio building and lasts about an hour. They offer some specialized tours of more limited days as well - I will definitely be visiting again for the architecture tour which takes you into at least one additional building you don't see on the general tour! The house? Fascinating. Our tour guide? Lovely. The grounds? Beautiful even in December. And a lovely little gift shop in Esherick's old garage where you can do some holiday shopping? Bonus. What's not to love about the Wharton Esherick Museum? I know I'll be returning to bring friends and family to this wonderful place in the future.

A 2 1/2 hour sailing trip on the Delaware on Labor Day afternoon sounded wonderful, peaceful and…read morecalming. I imagined sails unfurled taking us in the replica sailing vessel under the Delaware Memorial Bridge towards Philadelphia or perhaps southward towards the merge with the ocean. Two and one half hours sailing ... 150 minutes of sails billowing perhaps music playing and history being shared. Casual entertainment on the Delaware. We pulled out of New Castle under the ships motors at 3pm and were back unloading at 5pm. By my calculations that was exactly TWO HOURS not the promised 2 1/2 hours and no sailor, the seas were not rough nor the skies stormy. Two hours ... shortchanged by 30 full minutes of "sailing" time. Oh wait, we actually did not sail but several of us were called to duty to pull up the sails only to watch them billow for a couple of minutes before they were brought back down. And, those of us who helped really had to put our muscles and our backs to work to pull those sails upwards. We we're motorized for these 2 hours and actually we sat almost still for about 15 minutes. We never reached the Delaware Memorial Bridge (we headed north for this trip) and actually we did not cover much of the Delaware River on this 2-hour experience. The ship itself is awesome but perhaps some music or entertainment other than having to help the amazing volunteer crew with the sails would have made the cost/trip more worthwhile. We were handed a sheet with a scavenger hunt hinting that we and our shipmates should start searching for the answers but they never provided the answers to the scavenger hunt and there were no winners nor losers. It was as if it was an afterthought. The history narration was interesting but most on board either missed the announcement or couldn't find the docent providing us with insight on the Kalmar Nyckel. The extremely excessively large American flag kept hitting people on the foredeck wrapping itself around them, which was not a pleasant experience (You would think by now they would have purchased a smaller flag ). I felt worse for people with children because there was no energy in this TWO HOUR cruise ... it was calm and peaceful and I burned a few calories pulling ropes. Yelp asks ... "What could improve?" ... MUSIC, MORE INTERACTION by crew leaders, being truthful about how long the trip is, actually using the sails to move the boat, and travelling up or down more of the Delaware, which might lead the trip to last the advertised 2 1/2 hours.

We visited the Kalmar Nyckel Foundation Museum and Shipyard yesterday, and it exceeded my pretty…read morehigh expectations. We are visiting Sweden later this month on vacation, and (somehow - I don't remember how), I learned about the Kalmar Nyckel and thought: "Now that is the perfect thing to do leading out to our vacation in Sweden!" So off we went. We booked a sail on the boat - 9:30 a.m. on their opening day of the season. We arrived a few minutes before 9:00 to check in (as instructed when we purchased the tickets). That was great, because the Foundation's building is also home to a surprisingly great museum. The museum is on the upper floor of the building, and you can learn about navigation, sailing, the original Kalmar Nyckel, the replica of the Kalmar Nyckel, the colony of New Sweden (founded just a few minutes walk away from where you stand), and more. I knew nothing about the Kalmar Nyckel (had never even heard of it) and almost nothing about the colony of New Sweden. I got so much out of my visit. The Kalmar Nyckel was built in 1625 and eventually came to be owned by the Swedish city of Kalmar. When Sweden decided to establish a trading colony in the New World, the Kalmar Nyckel was one of two vessels selected to make the journey. The colony of New Sweden was founded in what is now Wilmington when the Kalmar Nyckel and the ship that accompanied it landed at the rocks just next to where the Kalmar Nyckel is docked now in 1638. The ship was sunk in 1652 off the coast of Scotland, but it made three more journeys to New Sweden and so was instrumental in the founding of the colony. In 1986, a group of Wilmington citizens established the Kalmar Nyckel Foundation, which designed, built, and launched the replica that you can see or sail on if you visit. After learning as much as we could in half an hour, we boarded the Kalmar Nyckel with around 50 others (lots of children and families) and went out for a sail on the Christina River on the ship. The ship is beautiful, and I spent a lot of time taking in the details (see my many pictures). The sail was lots of fun. The staff volunteers were amazing, answering lots of questions and providing lots of information throughout (there was a pirate story for the kids and a history talk for everyone during our 1 1/2 hour sail). There are opportunities to help the volunteer staff pull some ropes (sorry I can't provide technical language for what we did; not a sailor!). Important info: The Kalmar's sailing season is May-October, but it docks at some other East Coast locations throughout the season. So definitely take a look at their schedule on the website to ensure you're visiting on a day you can see and sail on the Kalmar! This was a wonderful experience. I learned a lot and had tons of fun. And it just felt so unique to this region and to Wilmington. Where else can you go for a sail on a 17th century replica of a Swedish vessel?! Definitely an activity to add to your to do list if you live in or are planning a visit to Wilmington. I was really glad we made this day trip up for our sail.

It's a beautiful art museum with a really nice garden in a cool area in the city, worth checking outread more

I'm a Delaware Art Museum member so I must say it is one of the best decisions that I have made in…read morerecent years joining. I have visited the museum many times over decades but in the last two years since joining, I've probably visited just as much as I did in all the time prior. There's quality diverse program on top of the standing exhibits in the galleries and visiting ones. I am a born Wilmingtonian and have always enjoyed culture and the arts, which again is why I have frequented this museum many times before, but I think it's a jewel that many locals neglect to appreciate. You don't have to go to the larger regional cities for acclaimed artists as many are here. The proximity to other places of interest in the area, can allow you to enjoy this and many others during a day or weekend trip if you're not local or live outside of the city. Join the mailing list and check the events because there is always something going; the images on my review are from a few of them. I keep saying I'm there so much I should join the team, but this is my way of supporting in sharing this review.

The museum has a great selection of historic pieces and historic planes, a good mix of civil and…read moremilitary planes, and lots of funny looking planes. The museum is not very big and probably takes 30 minutes to see everything.

Came here with kids, not remembering that we'd visited before. Is a nice, educational space where…read moreyou can learn about the physics and history of helicopter flight. There are a couple simulators and a whole bunch of helicopters you can climb into. Our kids also enjoyed the toy room, stepping outside to watch helicopters and planes at the nearby airport take off and land, and building our own paper helicopters to fly up in this fan. We'll be back!

I went here for the first time. It was bizarre that I have never been here since it is in my town…read more I thoroughly enjoyed it. The gardeners filled the place up with interesting plantings and trees. If Mt Cuba is close to your home, and you like plants, I recommend you visit. I will be back multiple times in the future.

It's cool for what it is... I definitely thought it was larger and it felt larger but it's really…read moresmall compared to other botanical gardens in the area. It's not worth the money if you want something to do for a few hours of your day. This is more less than an hour or 30 minutes activity.

For me, it was way too hot today for hiking/bird-watching, so this comment is focused on the indoor…read moredisplays and the house tour. I'm not a "bird person," whatever that means. What I mean is, I'm not a bird watcher and don't know much about bird habits or the sounds they make or their migration. But I can say that I learned a lot from the displays here today and enjoyed walking through the entire thing. It gave me a better appreciation for birds in nature, how they fly, the threats to their survival, etc. And the place isn't preachy. Just a very informative, pleasant learning experience. There's good information here that's well and efficiently presented; it's just enough - it's not stuffy or oppressive. The staff is helpful. We were fortunate that a house tour was beginning during our visit, and we joined that tour (included in the admission price). The tour is given by a volunteer docent. It was very informative, and we learned a great deal about Audubon (the good, bad and the ugly) and his life, marriage, his work and his valuable contributions to the field of bird studies. I'm giving this 5 stars for what we saw, and I'm assuming (confidently) that a walk/hike through the grounds on a nice day would be great.

Upon leaving I said to the receptionist, "I enjoyed this much more than I thought I would." To…read morewhich he replied, "thank you. I guess." When I go to an art museum I rarely read placards. Just interested in the art. At the Audobon center, I read everything. So interesting to learn about migration, how birds fly, their physiology ... and John James Audobon himself. What a colorful character. The mission of the center is to educate people to cherish and protect the natural world by preserving Audobon's artistic and scientific legacy. I had no particular interest in birds, but I was fascinated. The center is located on a bird sanctuary -- and the grounds are beautiful. There are trails which visitors are free to explore. BTW, if you're looking for a venue for a special event, check this place out. Staff was setting up for a wedding while we were there, and I was impressed.