We spent most of our visit in the Earth history part of the museum, full of fossils of dinosaurs and other prehistoric life. Each section has signs that explain how those fossils fit into the development of life. The signs have a good balance between being long enough to give you a good idea of what's in the exhibit and being short enough that you don't feel flooded with more details than you can take in. The signs are in both English and Spanish. As you walk from room to room, you retrace the history of life on Earth from earliest times to the geologically recent. In the last room, be sure to look up, to see the saber-tooth cat preparing to pounce! The museum has other exhibits, but the history of life was what we concentrated on. On the day that we visited, museum staff had telescopes set up outside so that we could look at the Sun. Also, a team from NASA had unrolled a large photo-map of the Moon on the floor of an upstairs room. All of us who visited that day could become "Moon walkers"!

Great Museum. We were on a staycation up from Santa Fe for a few days. With all the great museums in Santa Fe, we didn't know what to expect. We were pleasantly surprised. The museum had more than we could absorb in a couple of hours. On entering the museum is a Tyrannosaurus Rex. Occasionally it would become animated and move its head and growl (neato). There was a little one looking up saying, "Louder, louder." Obviously a hit with the kids. We are used to the Museum of Science and Nature in Denver. A tough comparison. But, they did well here. The museum is multi-faceted with lots of exhibits, each well done. A lot on dinosaurs. We spent three hours there and didn't do it all. The only drawback is that their little café seems permanently closed. Would have been nice to sit and share our experience - or just take a breather from all the mind-work. Wold love to return.

A nice museum with a variety of fare, including live animals in one room. Some great dinosaur stuff, which was my motivation for visiting. Fossils, murals, reconstructions representing the varied life that existed in NM. There was a nice room of art pertaining to mammals and mineral cases as well. I would give about 90 minutes for a visit.