Wichita Attractions Tour aims to lure locals, visitors with prize package
A new promotion among Wichita’s top attractions launches this weekend and the potential payoff is a sort-of golden ticket for one lucky winner.
Pick up a Wichita Attractions Tour passport and get it stamped by at least six of the 13 participating attractions and museums between May 28 and Sept. 6. Then submit your completed passport no later than Sept. 13 to be entered in a drawing to win a 2022 family season pass or membership to all 12 participating attractions and one Wichita Wind Surge home baseball game of your choosing.
Visit Wichita, a membership which markets the greater Wichita area as a convention and tourism destination, is organizing the new tour alongside its Wicked Brew Tour, a passport program started in 2015 to encourage visits to craft breweries and coffee shops that offers a limited edition T-shirt as reward.
“After a trying year for the tourism and hospitality industry—and for those who love to travel—we’re excited to provide a new, fun way for visitors and locals to explore the many amazing museums, attractions, eateries, breweries and coffee shops in our city,” Susie Santo, president & CEO of Visit Wichita, said in a news release announcing the two summer promotions.
Jacky Goerzen, Old Cowtown Museum’s executive director, said the program is a welcome addition to inspire more visitors, whether they are local or out-of-towners.
“After the last year, all of the attractions could use a little attendance boost, and I see this as being beneficial for all,” she told the Eagle.
Goerzen hopes the passport will incentivize people who have never visited Old Cowtown, 1865 Museum Blvd., or who haven’t visited in a while to get out and discover, appreciate and experience the city’s history.
“With our new First Fridays Under the Stars and Community Fair Days, plus the new events we have this year, we are hoping to see people checking out the museum and seeing what we have to offer,” Goerzen said.
She’s referring to several new themed events at the living history museum set in the 1860s as well as two recurring monthly events for the season.
First Fridays Under the Stars started in May and runs through Nov. 5. Admission, normally $9 for adults and $6 for ages 5-11, is $6 for all ages during the event’s 6 to 10 p.m. timeframe. You can explore the museum on your own, join a ghost tour among some of Wichita’s oldest preserved and replica structures, watch costumed interpreters stage a gunfight and purchase food and drink from The Bomb BBQ food truck and the Shaken or Stirred bar truck Mobiletini.
Community Fair Day is the third Sunday of each month through October and it runs the same hours the museum is open on Sunday, noon to 5 p.m. Admission is free and includes Cowtown’s normal schedule of daily activities as well as more than 50 artists, creators and vendors selling their goods throughout the museum grounds.
Two additional themed days for 2021 include A Day in the Life on June 12, which recreates an entire day in Wichita’s history based on newspaper archives, and Women of the West on Sept. 4. These activities are included with regular admission and join other themed days from previous years, including Celebrate America on July 3, National Day of the Cowboy on July 24 and People of the Plains on Aug. 28, among others.
Beyond the grand prize, Visit Wichita is giving away weekly prizes of Wichita-themed items such as T-shirts and luggage tags. They’ll choose winners from among people who post a photo of themselves at a participating location with their Wichita Attractions Tour passport. You can post to Facebook, Instagram or Twitter and tag @visitwichita for that contest.
In addition to Old Cowtown Museum, the attractions and museums participating in the inaugural Wichita Attractions Tour are:
Botanica Wichita, 701 Amidon St.
Exploration Place, 300 N. McLean Blvd.
Field Station: Dinosaurs, 2999 N. Rock Road in Derby
Kansas Aviation Museum, 3350 George Washington Blvd.
Mid-America All-Indian Museum, 650 N. Seneca St.
Museum of World Treasures, 835 E. 1st St. N.
Sedgwick County Zoo, 5555 W. Zoo Blvd.
Tanganyika Wildlife Park, 1000 S. Hawkins Lane in Goddard
The Kansas African American Museum, 601 N. Water St.
Wichita Art Museum, 1400 Museum Blvd.
Wichita-Sedgwick County Historical Museum, 204 S. Main St.
Wichita Wind Surge playing at Riverfront Stadium, 300 S. Sycamore St.
You can pick up a passport at any of these participating spots, or at the Visit Wichita offices, 515 S. Main St., Suite 115, 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday. Completed passports can be dropped off at Visit Wichita during those same hours or mailed; they must be received by Sept. 13 to be entered in the drawing.
Entries for the Sept. 17 drawing are limited to one passport per person. See visitwichita.com/attractions-tour for full details of the Wichita Attractions Tour.