Miscellany: South Florida Science Center and Aquarium

It's been rainy here in West Palm Beach, so I visited the South Florida Science Center and Aquarium, located south of downtown inside Dreher Park. I remember going there as a kid, back when it was known simply as the "South Florida Science Museum." 

Stepping into the place now, I have to admit that it's a pretty small science museum, even with the addition of a marine biology wing and 10,000 gallons' worth of fish tanks:

Another thing they didn't have on my elementary school field trips was Science on a Sphere, a neat room-sized spherical globe that provides vivid displays of weather systems throughout the Solar System:

There's a new miniature golf course outside (a bit boring, but passable), and the rest of the museum is taken up by small science demo stations and the planetarium. Honestly, I've seen a lot bigger and better planetariums around the country (the one in the new Frost Science Museum in Miami is supposed to be incredible), so it's hard to recommend this one, especially considering that you have to pay an extra fee to get in:

Like a lot of things, the Science Center looked and felt a lot bigger in my memory, but if you don't want to shuttle the kids down to a larger science museum in Fort Lauderdale or Miami, I think the South Florida Science Center and Aquarium will do the job.