Tucson - Things to Do - Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum

Part zoo, part garden, the top-quality Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum is fourteen miles west of the university along Speedway Boulevard, in Tucson Mountain Park (daily: MarchSept 7.30am5pm; OctFeb 8.30am5pm; adults $9.95 NovApril, $8.95 MayOct, ages 612 $1.75; www.desertmuseum.org ). Indoor displays, including a walk-through cave and mine, highlight regional geology and history, and a series of glass-fronted cages are occupied by tarantulas, rattlesnakes and other creepy-crawlies. In enclosures along the looped path beyond a hot walk in high summer bighorn sheep, mountain lions, jaguars and other seldom-seen desert denizens prowl in credible simulations of their natural habitats, and a colony of impish prairie dogs goes about its impenetrable business. Hawks and bald eagles fly about their own large aviary, thankfully separated from a greenhouse-full of hummingbirds. The museum also serves as an animal rescue center: almost all the animals you see were injured in some way before ending up here, and would be unable to survive on their own.