Kid’s have various interests. Our middle daughter loves all things bone-related. Here are her favorite bone finds.
Natural History Museums
Most major city will boast one of these. These are the top 10 favorites of Natural Museums we have been to. As you can see they are not necessarily ranked according to size, since some of the smaller museums are often laid out more accessibly or may have the most interesting exhibits.
1. Field Museum, Chicago, IL
2. American Museum of Natural History, Central Park, New York, NY
3. Carnegie Museum of Natural History, Pennsylvania, PA
4. Natural History Museum, London, UK
5. Canadian Museum of Nature, Ottawa
6. Houston Museum of Natural Science
7. Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, D.C.
8. Museum national d’histoire naturelle, Paris
9. Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, Ontario
10. University of Michigan Museum of Natural History, Ann Arbor, MI
Catacombs
L’Ossuaire Municipla or commonly known as the catacombes of Paris, tops her list of cool places with bones. I stayed above ground at a near-by McDonalds with my oldest squeemish kid. The younger two went with their dad to underground graveyard of six million people. There are more walls of skulls and bones than you can shake a femur at. The girls emerged invigorated and full of new tales to tell. Still on our creepy to do list, the Roman catacombs.
Famous Graveyards
Above ground in certain countries, graveyard tours. If you are going to visit one of these, it’s worth paying for an actual tour which will bring some of the stories to life. We visited these two–Cimetiere du Pere-Lachaise, located on Boulevard de Menilmontant – Jim Morrison from the Doors buried here. Cimetiere du Montparnasse, the largest Paris cemetary at 110 acres, located on Boulevard de Menilmontant.
Archeological Digs
By far, best bone experience we had was stumbling upon an archaeological dig. We were hiking on a mountain outside of Laudun, France and came upon a huge archaeological site. They were extracting bones from a cemetery that was 3000+ years old. We spent most of the afternoon there since the lead-digger was from the U.S. and was eager to tell us about the site. She showed us mass baby graves, parent/child graves. Fascinating day, and one we will never forget. Turns out you can visit some archaeological digs if you take the time to set it up ahead of time.