Astrofest Wichita
This is a fun way to spend an evening looking at the stars. It’s great for children, although there is slightly less to do for adults. Each hour they move the large telescope to view a different planet or so. A lot of hobbiest astronomers bring their big expensive telescopes to let you look through and take pictures through. Astrofest Wichita is well worth a visit if you’re in town!
This event is relatively new in Wichita, I attended the 2d iteration in 2018. They have a bunch of raffles so if you actually want to win something the best idea is to show up early as there will be no one there. Later, your chances will be a lot less as the popularity of this event has already grown quite a lot.
The event is rather cute with lots of space nerds (I say this with fondness, I am also a space nerd but a less knowledgable one :P) floating about the place, many dressed up as storm troopers. There’s scavenger hunts for the children and information panels. We got there late and mainly wanted to stargaze so I can’t say how in-depth these presentations were, but you could grab pretty much anyone working there and they’d have the answer to pretty much any question.
The highlight was the telescope inside as well as the many new, computerized telescopes out on the patio with all the space-hobby people. They were all really helpful, some armed with laser pointers to help find constellations. Wichita is a fairly good area to star-gaze, it’s not the best but it’s better than most cities. Many of the people were nice enough to set it up so you could take pictures through their telescopes – which is how I would up with the picture of the moon above 😀
All-in-all, especially if you have children, if you like space Astrofest Wichita is a fun event to go to. I believe it was around $8 to get in.
Check out some other things to do in Wichita!
Frank Lloyd Wright House Tea Party
Night at the Museum of World Treasures Harry Potter Theme
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