Reciprocal Passes

          
   Anyone who has been reading our blog for awhile has probably realized that we like to wander and see new things along the way ,anything from a bizarre roadside attraction to the most popular national parks.Our discovery of reciprocal passes has given us a  slew of new places to go. We started with a science museum pass and added others through the years.The latest one is a art museum and garden pass. We hadn’t realized how much we would enjoy visiting these places and the fact that they are free makes it that much better.  Not quite free though because the pass has to be bought but it doesn’t take long to recover the initial money. The art museum and garden pass is the most expensive pass that we’ve bought but considering the admission prices to both of these types of attractions , it’s a real bargain.  Most individual admissions are about $20.00 so we would not be visiting very many of them without the pass.

  There are a couple of things to consider before buying a pass. First check your home state or the states that you’ll be visiting to make sure that you’ll actually be using them enough to make them economical. For instance Washington state is a good place for the Time Travelers Pass or an Art Museum Pass but not very good for a Garden Pass. Florida is great for both art museums and gardens but the only people who might want to buy a Science Museum Pass would be families with very young children. Another thing to check is reciprocally within the state or region. Sometimes the passes are limited to areas outside of a certain radius of the home museum membership. The St. Petersburgs area of Florida recently included this restriction so if you’re planning on visiting Florida ,get a pass from another state.

  One pass that we have is from Winterthur Museum in Delaware. It’s a combination pass good at 270 gardens and 400 museums. A yearly pass, which will admit two people ,is $150.00 but the price is quickly made up with a few museum visits. For instance just in the St. Petersburg/Sarasota area one visit per couple to each of these museums adds up to  $159.00.

Ringling Museum– $50.00
Marie Selby Botanical Gardens– $34.00
Museum of Fine Arts – $34.00
Salvador Dali Museum -  $41.00

  The links to the passes that we like best are listed here - Passes