Rainy day 5
A weekendSonoma County's hands-on kids museum: indoor science and art exhibits plus Mary's Garden outside, with a water-play creek, climbing structures and a nature zone.
A lake with a paved loop for scooters and bikes, a swimming lagoon in summer, and picnic tables in the shade.
A destination playground: an Old West town and a Native American village to climb through, built for all abilities. Around it, a mini train, carousel and boating lake.
A community-built county park with a playground, skate features and sports courts, made as a neighborhood unity project.
A post-fire rebuild with brand-new equipment and clean surfacing, climbing and swings for a range of ages, and a big lawn.
Downtown Santa Rosa's shady green: a well-covered climbing structure mid-lawn, bocce and picnic tables, steps from the downtown core.
Santa Rosa's original play cafe: a real breakfast-and-lunch restaurant with a supervised play area built in, so kids roam while you finish a hot coffee.
A renovated motor lodge on Cleveland Ave with an outdoor pool, fire pits and family rooms, minutes from the Schulz Museum.
Peanuts headquarters: comic-strip exhibits and hands-on cartooning at the museum, then public skating across the street in the rink Charles Schulz built.
A spray ground with 15 water features and two picnic areas with shade covers.
Santa Rosa's retro-icon resort and classic wine-country family base: a huge heated Olympic-size pool scene, lawn games, ice rink next door at Snoopy's, and family suites.
Santa Rosa's pizza legend: kids get a ball of raw pizza dough to play with at the table, then watch their own creation come out of the wood oven.
A 400-acre African wildlife preserve above Santa Rosa and the Bay Area's only true safari: open-jeep rides past giraffes, rhinos and zebras, aviaries, overnight tents.
A natural play area for climbing and digging at the trailhead, then big-view hikes up slopes where cows graze.
Casual Italian in Montgomery Village where kids eat free on Thursdays: piadine, pizzas, and pastas with a shopping-center patio.
Downtown-adjacent full-service Hyatt on Railroad Street: outdoor pool and gardens, walkable to Railroad Square's restaurants, the reliable chain anchor in Santa Rosa.
Burgers with a play area, chalkboard walls and foosball tables, and a kids menu for 12 and under.
A toddler play area for ages 4 and under, a mega play structure for 4 to 10, and a Saturday-morning Little Leapers hour at Sky Zone for ages 6 and under.
Kids under 6 get in free, and on Open Cockpit Saturdays (one a month, April to October) they can sit inside some of the planes.
A shallow instructional pool next to the lap pool and a 140-foot water slide; kids need to be 48 inches to ride it.
An accessible playground is the center of this park, with sports fields and a concession stand.
The kids' menu has butter pasta, spaghetti with a house-made meatball, and chicken tenders.
Cups of spaghetti with a meatball, half grilled cheese with fruit and PB&J make up the kids' side of a big deli and grill menu.
A winery started by a retired fire chief, with a vintage fire truck in the barn that kids want to see.
