13 Things To Do With Family in Oakland, California

Oakland First Fridays

Every first Friday night of the month, Oakland First Fridays is a lively street event in the middle of Downtown Oakland that is great for families. People can enjoy food trucks, lively street performers, interactive art projects, craft vendors, gallery openings, live music, and more on more than 20 city blocks.

At this free event every month, families can take their time and walk around to find new sounds, sights, foods, and beats. Some of Oakland’s best bars, restaurants, and cultural places are also open late on First Fridays. This makes it a fun night out for both adults and kids.

Jack London Square

Right on the beautiful waterfront of Oakland, Jack London Square is full of things to see, do, and eat that are great for kids. The square is named after the famous American author who used to live nearby. It has a cabin from Jack London’s Klondike experiences, nice places to sit outside, a farmer’s market on Sundays, and free movie nights in the summer.

You can watch a baseball game at the Oakland A’s stadium across the water, learn about science through hands-on activities on the USS Potomac, or get cool by shopping Oaklandish’s clothes and gifts that are inspired by the area. No matter what you decide, Jack London Square’s lively, walkable atmosphere with shops, bars, and regular events makes it easy for families to have fun together.

Camino Restaurant

The menu at Camino changes with the seasons and is based on house-made products and cooking over an open fire. The restaurant has a casual atmosphere that is great for families who love to eat. Kids will love the dishes that are wood-roasted in Camino’s huge hearth oven, and adults will love the refined yet simple food, like hearth bread, pork roasts, and creative vegetable sides that Chef Russell Moore makes so well.

Even though service can be slow, this 40-seat restaurant’s friendly staff and cozy setting make it easy to linger over delicious flavors. Most of the food at Camino costs less than $30 a plate, so parents can enjoy fine eating without all the fuss while kids watch chefs use new techniques.

Rosamunde Sausage Grill

When you take your family on a food tour of Oakland, you have to stop at Rosamunde Sausage Grill for some loaded gourmet hot dogs and sausages. Rosamunde has been grilling free-range, long-term meats in three sites around town since 2011. It has a devoted following of locals, including many kids who love its crispy fries.

On the menu, you can choose from traditional wiener dogs and fusion tastes like duck sausage with orange ginger. You can also add a lot of different toppings to the hearty buns. Rosamunde’s craft beer list shows off the great microbrew scene in Northern California. For kids, there are ginger ale drinks and chocolate phosphates to drink. With prices between $6 and $9 for a loaded dog, this cool spot shows that families, friends, and artisan sausages are great company.

Children’s Fairyland

Children’s Fairyland is a beautiful lakeside theme park designed just for kids ages 10 and under. No family trip to Oakland would be complete without making memories there. Fairyland has play areas based on old stories and baby rhymes like Mother Goose, Alice in Wonderland, Little Red Riding Hood, and more. It opened in 1950 and has become a classic theme park.

Families love visiting the museum for young children, riding the Circus Train roller coaster, and petting the goats at the petting zoo. Parents also like that the park is small enough for little legs. On the shores of Lake Merritt, Children’s Fairyland offers hours of family-friendly fun with storybook sets, gentle fair rides, arts and crafts, and live puppet shows. Families come back generation after generation.

Lakeside Park

Lakeside Park is right next to the Lake Merritt Boating Center. It’s over 20 acres of green space where families can eat, play, and enjoy the beautiful views of the lake. Lakeside Park is always busy, especially on the weekends, with runners going around the 3 mile loop past palm trees, families grilling on lawn circles, friends playing beach volleyball on sand courts, and kids climbing on the Jesse James pirate ship playground.

You can rent a surrey bike for four people and take a relaxing ride around the lake. Stop by the Singing Tower musical waterfall to take selfies. Lakeside Park frames Lake Merritt’s natural beauty in a u-shape. You can paddleboard, pedal boat, ride bikes, or just sit on picnic blankets there.

Oakland Museum of California

The Oakland Museum of California (OMCA) is one of the biggest museums in the Bay Area. It covers 10 acres and is a must-see for families traveling to Oakland. The museum has permanent displays about California’s art, history, and nature sciences. These are interactive displays that kids and adults will both enjoy.

Families can look at life-sized copies of a Yurok redwood canoe or a whole Miwok town. In the natural sciences hall, they can learn about California’s many ecosystems and be amazed by beautiful works of art that show the state’s landscape from the 1800s onward. The Oakland Museum of California makes learning about the culture of the area fun and immersive for people of all ages by letting them take special backpacks for families.

Chabot Space & Science Center

Chabot Space & Science Center is an out-of-this-world place for kids and parents to become pilots or just look at the stars. The center covers more than 8 acres and has exhibits inside and outside that show spacecraft, telescopes, and a digital theater with shows about astronomy and space exploration.

At the observatory, families can use telescopes to look at objects in space. In the physics lab, they can do hands-on science projects and pretend to be astronauts going on missions to Mars, the Moon, and other planets. Chabot also has special programs for kids, such as training for future scientists, overnight camping trips, and live shows with animatronics. Space and science fans will have a great time at this center for a whole day. There is so much to learn and discover.

Oakland Zoo

The Oakland Zoo is home to over 750 native and exotic species that live in lush natural environments. These animals range in size from tiny meerkats to huge tigers. The zoo has many areas that families can enjoy all day. The African Savanna habitat has giraffes, zebras, and rhinos, the Wayne and Gladys Valley Children’s Zoo has farm animals that kids can pet and feed, and the Arroyo Dog Park is a great place for the whole family, even the dogs, to go for a hike.

If you want to see different attractions from above, take the aerial gondola. Then, stay for one of the educational animal shows in the zoo’s amphitheater. Oakland Zoo is a great place for people of all ages to spend a whole day because it has large outdoor areas, shady walking paths that are great for strollers, and restaurants that serve both kid-friendly food and gourmet food for adults.

Fairyland

Fairyland is a beautiful 10-acre theme park right on the shores of Lake Merritt that has been fun for East Bay children since 1950. Fairyland is a place for kids 10 and younger that brings magic and folklore to life through play structures, gentle rides, storybook sets, and live puppet shows.

Families can visit areas with themes like Mother Goose, Alice in Wonderland, Little Red Riding Hood, and more. They can also visit the petting farm and pet the goats, chickens, and rabbits. Finally, they can ride Fantasyland’s train, carousel, and dragon rollercoaster. Fairyland is a unique amusement park that young kids will love. It’s cheap to get in, there are lots of shaded places for parents, and kids are sure to have magical memories there.

See also: Top 12 Hiking Trails in santa-rosa

Lake Merritt Boating Center

You can go on your own boating trips with your family on beautiful Lake Merritt! The Lake Merritt Boating Center is right on the water and lets people rent kayaks, canoes, rowboats, pedal boats, sailboats, and the famous stand-up paddleboards by the hour.

Families can enjoy valuable time together on the water while paddling along Lake Merritt. They can see gardens by the lake, bird sanctuaries, bonsai groves, and Oakland’s downtown skyline. On summer Sundays, the center gives free lessons for people who are just starting out with kayaking and stand-up paddleboarding. This is a great time for the whole family to try something new. Lake Merritt is a great place to spend an afternoon messing around with boats because it’s easy to rent them and the water is nice.

USS Potomac

The USS Potomac, FDR’s famous presidential boat that is now a floating museum, is also docked at Lake Merritt. Families can travel back to the 1930s by visiting this grand ship, which was once called the “Floating White House” because of its stately main deck, nautical artifacts, and displays about President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s time in office.

There are also regular lunch and sunset cruises on the Potomac that are a great way to see Lake Merritt and Oakland’s waterfront from a unique point of view that you won’t soon forget.

Conclusion

Oakland’s lively culture, diversity, long history, and many family-friendly sites give visitors a huge range of ways to make memories with their families. Oakland has a lot of fun, interactive things for kids to do. There are hands-on museums and educational centers, as well as amusement parks, zoos, and lake trips that are just right for kids.

Families can have fun and get food at the same time in the city’s walkable center neighborhoods, which are full of kid-friendly restaurants. Families can enjoy the peaceful beauty of Lake Merritt by boating, biking, and playing in beautiful open green areas like Lakeside Park.

Families should plan to spend a lot of time in Oakland when they visit the San Francisco Bay Area. This is the best way to see why people love living in this nice, thriving city.