TICKETS: $7 for adults, $5 for seniors and children ages 5 to 18, $2 for children ages 2-4, FREE for children under 2. Group rates are available. Unlimited access for Odyssey members. Family memberships cost $60 a year. Rooms and party packages are available for birthday parties. Educator passes and AAA discounts are available.
The future of the interactive, nonprofit museum became a question mark earlier this year, when its lease was terminated by the Port of Seattle – a move taken to clear the museum’s longstanding rental debt off the port’s books. Under an agreement with the port, Odyssey will remain open at least through the end of the year, but will have to vie against other businesses that bid for its spot on Seattle’s Pier 66 on Alaskan Way.
My munchkins are 4 years and 18 months, and I had to drag them out of the place at the end of our morning.
By Erika Lee
The Odyssey Maritime Discovery Center is a perfect destination for families with kids of all ages. My munchkins are 4 years and 18 months, and I had to drag them out of the place at the end of our morning. The magic begins as you walk through the entry and come upon a large tiered water table complete with step stools of varying heights and multiple hand dryers. Your children (and you) can build a lock, change water currents, send fish and boats down the channels or simply splash in the water. We were there for 20 minutes.
Be sure to pick up a sticker picture page at the entrance. Throughout the museum, there are 18 large oyster shells mounted on walls near exhibits. Some open and spit out a sticker that goes on a square of your picture page. Once you’ve found all eight, a seaworthy picture is yours to take home. This is a great activity to keep the hide-n-seek, sticker-loving set moving through the museum.
There are hands-on exhibits everywhere you turn, including model cargo ships that you can load up with containers. You can also pull on a life vest and load fish on a conveyor belt and onto a small fishing vessel, or crawl into a snug, enclosed lifeboat and pretend you’re stranded at sea waiting for a Coast Guard rescue.
There are interactive kayaks and canoes, too. Climb in and as you paddle, watch your virtual voyage on a screen in front of you as you glide through Skagit or Elliott bays. You can also sit in a container and watch a short film in which you became a container and travel by rail from Boston to Seattle, then onto a cargo ship at the Port of Seattle.
On the upper floor, there’s a fantastic view of Elliott Bay. You can research and identify the vessels you see with radar screens, binoculars and touch-screen computers. My daughter pretended to steer a ship at sea, clambering up onto a captain’s chair in a replica of a Navy destroyer bridge, complete with live radar and chatter from ships passing outside.
The greatest thing about this place was that my husband and I had fun, too. All of that interactive play gave us some great opportunities to talk about the sea, life in the ocean and how our lives are connected to and affected by all our seas and waterways.
