After seeing a few World Cup games, taking in the sights at the downtown fan festival, and waiting in line for restrooms at NRG Stadium, visitors to Houston are probably going to need a break from all things soccer. It’s an ideal time to see what else the city has to offer, even though traffic to and from them might be a tad tough during the World Cup.
Considering the seemingly regular rocket launches and tests in Texas, why not see the history of how it all started at Space Center Houston? The center features more than 400 artifacts, from small things like the lithium hydroxide canister that helped save the Apollo 13 astronauts, to the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. Several immersive exhibits can give you a taste of the astronaut experience, and a tram tour will give you a smoother ride than a rocket around Johnson Space Center, including the original Mission Control. And let’s not forget flight director Gene Krantz’s lucky vest. It’s a nice vest.
Spanning 55 acres, the Houston Zoo is home to more than 6,000 residents from around the globe who don’t like the heat any more than you do. They include gorillas, giraffes, elephants, penguins and countless others, not to mention the Galápagos Islands exhibit, the creepy and crawly Bug House, and the less-threatening Wildlife Carousel. The zoo is situated in Hermann Park, the beautiful 445-acre green oasis in the heart of Houston, which is more for people watching.
Though it’s a cistern and Houston will be hot as hell during the World Cup, this is not the place to go for a refreshing drink of water. This underground historic site once held the city’s drinking water, sprung an irreparable leak, and now it’s a decommissioned, eerie 87,500-square-foot expanse filled with columns reflecting off the remaining water on the reservoir’s floor. It looks like a great place for a chase in a thriller movie. But failing that, you can catch the current art installation Undercurrents by Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, which transforms the space into an echoing chamber of reverberating sounds and laser-like lights.
With nearly 80,000 works of art from antiquity to the present, the Museum of Fine Arts is probably a multi-day affair, depending on how many of those little art-adjacent information cards you read. The collection includes European art from the 13th to early 20th century, work from early-20th-century masters from Latin America, as well as an “Arts of Asia” collection that encompasses the cultures of China, the Himalayas, India, Japan, Korea, and Southeast Asia. And the cafe has some decent offerings.
Among the more unique museums in Houston, or anywhere, the National Museum of Funeral History is a great place to go when you’re feeling melancholy after your team lost. It houses the largest collection of funeral service memorabilia in the country, including historical hearses, memorabilia from presidential funerals, and exhibits on how different cultures honor their dead. You’ll learn more than you ever wanted to know about death care, and feel much more alive after leaving.