The 5 Best Things To Do In Waco With Kids

Addie Gross Day Trips

Waco is under 2 hours drive from Austin, making it an ideal day trip with kids! With its vibrant culture and array of attractions, Waco offers an unforgettable experience for kids and adults alike. From exploring wildlife at the Cameron Park Zoo to diving into the history of everyone’s favorite soft drink at the Dr Pepper Museum, there’s something for every member of the family to enjoy. In this blog post, we’ll highlight 5 of the best kid-friendly activities in Waco, including where to stay (with a discount code!) ensuring your family getaway is packed with fun and adventure.

Mayborn Museum

We started our Waco day at the Mayborn Museum (1300 S. University Parks Dr., Waco). It’s a children’s museum on Baylor University’s campus. Admission is $8-10 and they are open from 10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. Monday-Saturday (’til 8:00 p.m. on Thursday) and from 1-5:00 p.m. on Sunday. Kids under 2 are free. The museum wasn’t huge, but a good size to get through the entire place in a couple of hours.

My boys loved the Bubble and Water Room (you may want to remember to bring a change of clothes if your kids like to get wet). I feel like they got to play for a long time in each area and yet we still moved at a reasonable pace and were able to explore the whole museum. They also loved the music/light room and spent so long playing the floor piano (like from the movie Big!)

We got there right at 10:00 a.m. and stayed until noon, which was when our tummies told us it was time for lunch. We decided to try the favorite local sandwich shop, Schmaltz’s (105 S. 5th St., Waco). The place was packed, but we managed to stalk a table just in time. The sandwiches were fantastic and the shop was close enough for us to walk to our next adventure, the Dr. Pepper Museum (300 S. 5th St., Waco)!

Dr. Pepper Museum

If your kids are mostly interested in just getting Dr. Pepper, you may want to skip touring the museum and just go to the soda fountain part. You can usually find a Groupon to lower your admission cost if you’d like to do the full tour. If you’d like to save time in order to do more in Waco (or have kids who just want the soda and don’t care for the tour), I recommend just getting some treats at the soda fountain and snapping some pictures in front of the cool truck out front. We’ve done both and I can’t really recommend doing the full tour unless your kids are super obsessed with Dr. Pepper. It is interesting though! My kids just really love the soda fountain.

Cameron Park Zoo

Once we were well-sugared and ready for our next adventure, we drove over to the Cameron Park Zoo (1701 N. 4th St., Waco). Admission is $12-16 (children 2 and under are FREE) and they are open from 9:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. Monday-Saturday and from 11:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. on Sunday. The zoo is just the right size for little kids and is easily doable in a couple of hours. Over the zoo’s 52 acres you will find over 1700 animals in natural habitats. One of my favorite features of this zoo was the shady little playground in the middle of it, where the kids can run around and play and you can take a break from walking if you’d like.

Cameron Park & Splash Pad

This would be the perfect place for a picnic lunch after visiting the zoo. If it’s a hot day, make sure you bring swimsuits and towels and take advantage of the splash pad. It’s right along the river, so watch your kids!

Fabled Bookshop

We adore this sweet little local book shop. They have an adorable children’s section filled with books and unique toys. Perfect spot to stop into on a rainy day! There’s also a coffee shop inside.

Where To Stay: Casa Kumwesu

The ice cream house of Waco! Need I say more? This house is amazing and has the ability to sleep so many! You could easily fit a huge family (or two or three families) here. It’s adorable and the ideal place to stay with kids. Every little detail has been considered, from the drawer pulls in the kitchen, to all the incredible photo-ops- even the tissue boxes are cute! My kids love the upstairs loft with all the games, Ms Pac-Man, and giant bean bags. It’s a kid’s dream come true! There are 3 bedrooms downstairs along with a full kitchen. The house is close to all of the activities mentioned above, making it such a perfect location.

Not that you need any more convincing, but right now we are also offering you a discount code! Use code: AustinFFK for 10% off your stay at Casa Kumwesu!

Bonus Activities

Two more bonus activities you can explore when in Waco are the Waco Mammoth National Monument and the Magnolia Silos. We haven’t visited these, but know that they are huge attractions to the Waco area and would be fun to tack onto your trip if you have time!