High Desert Museum, where science, history, language arts, music, and visual arts all come together.

Today's post is about our visit to the High Desert Museum in Bend, OR.  I hope to learn how to get my videos posted in YouTube with a link in my blog.  Let's see how it goes. 
We were quite impressed with this museum.  There was a lot of science, of course, with the science of water, forest fires, animals, climate change, and the desert.  There was history with exhibits of Native Americans, and early settlers to OR.  They had a house and outbuildings outside.  Looks like they have a "family" there on the weekends talking about what they do, with a working saw mill.  You will see how the arts are used in my pictures.

The first part we visited was the Desertarium.  Here are a few of the animals they had on display.  All animals in these pictures are alive.  My favorite, of course, were the turtles and owls.

The glass cages made photography a challenge for me and my iPhone.  They were a very good size.  The black widow spider hid from me, but Richard saw it.

These are newts.  The picture doesn't do them justice.

The next section we explored was called Desert Reflections: Water Shapes the West. This display weaves together science, history, art, and contemporary issues to explore the role of water in the region's past, present and future.  

 This display is in the hallway going into Desert Reflections.  Click on the video and listen to the music played along with the moving sculpture.  If you click on the picture the explanation should enlarge and be easier to read. 

 There were three displays like the one above showing the ecology of different areas. 

This explains how the artists were inspired for their works.

Next is the Hall of Exploration and Settlement

There were lots of exhibits in this area, but I took only a few pictures.  It was done very well.

If you can see the long pieces of grass or reed tied together, they make a kayak!  

This is the inside of a mine.  You walk through the rooms that all have life size exhibits.  They are the type that you feel like you are a part of the exhibit.  It was very much like that since there weren't many people there.  

Then we pop out of the dark mine to a sluce box.  And yes, the water was running.

This felt like a street, it had a building on the left, too, but the angle was too hard to get it in the pic.  We only had 2 hours at this museum, so I didn't really get to look much here.

I know this picture is poor, but I like how the sun caught the needles on the porcupines.  As you walk around the museum they had exhibits here and there with live animals.  This was like a mini courtyard with live porcupines.  They were sleeping.  I think they come out when kids visit.

Next stop were the Raptors.  I was pretty excited to see this.  They have a raptor show, but we left before the show.  

A Golden Eagle

A Barn Owl

And inside were a couple of Barred Owls.  I was hoping to see a falcon or Kestrel, but they didn't have those birds.

This looked quite helpful since I see many raptors flying in our travels.

An outside pond with trout.

 There were these very nice paths going from the main museum, to the raptor house, to a homestead, to the otters, and back.

This is walking up to the homestead.  There was nothing going on.  We figure that there are people working there doing demonstrations on the weekends, and during the summer.  Kind of a bummer to pay the same price and not have everything happening.

The only life we saw were the chickens in the chicken coop.

 The pic on the left shows a chipmunk near the corner of the coop.  There were two running in and out of the coop with their cheeks full.  I should have thought of taking a video.

Here is a working mill, just not working today.

 This was a very nice, big enclosure for the otters.  I didn't get a picture above the water.  They had a nice sized pond with a stream and waterfalls to play in.  The picture on the left where you can see my reflection was a hole where all were sleeping.  Very dark and not photogenic.

 And if you felt so lead-you could write a poem here on the tree. 

Just another nice picture of the museum land.

 How about a tall pile of blankets?

 A few more displays-Native American Jewelry.  Fishing.  There are real trout swimming in this display.

AND if your dog is with you, you can have it kept in a kennel here so it doesn't sit in your hot car.  Leinen would spend his time "talking" to everyone who walked by.  lol.  It never mentioned if it cost anything.  It seems quite crude, but maybe they are planning to have something better for the future.

That's the end of this visit.  I give it 5 stars, and I hope to return to read some exhibits in detail, and to see the raptor show.  Thanks for reading, and please comment.