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A few years ago a strange but intriguing picture popped up in my Facebook feed. It was an open refrigerator full of a bright, white light that a woman was walking into. It turns out this was the famous Meow Wolf refrigerator, which you can walk through to enter the trippy, bizarre Meow Wolf universe.
Fast forward to November 2017- Tom took me to Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico to experience the ultimate psychedelic playground for ourselves!
What is Meow Wolf?
Excellent question! Even after spending 7 hours exploring Meow Wolf I’m still not sure I know the answer…
On paper Meow Wolf is an immersive, interactive art exhibit imagined into existence by hundreds of artists, and largely funded by George R.R. Martin (the author of Game of Thrones).
In experience Meow Wolf is an enormous interactive psychedelic playground that assaults your senses with a myriad of textures, smells, colors, lights, and sounds. Truly, it is unlike anything we’ve ever seen, and Tom and I have certainly seen some things (Read our Burning Man preparation guide or my story of going to Burning Man alone)!
Inside Meow Wolf you enter The House of Eternal Return, and from there the experience becomes a choose your own adventure of the extremely psychedelic variety. There are portals you can climb and crawl through that take you from the large victorian house into a beautiful and bizarre inter-dimensional space where anything is possible. We found ourselves laying underneath screaming multi-colored eyeballs, sitting in an icebox of infinity mirrors, and playing a giant laser beam harp in a room devoid of light.
Sound overstimulating? At times it really was, so keep that in mind when planning your visit. Few experiences fully encapsulate Hunter S. Thompson’s quote “Buy the ticket. Take the ride.” the way Meow Wolf does.
There is also a mystery and storyline that you can choose to follow or not. We followed pieces of the story, but it’s very complicated and would likely take multiple visits to fully solve the mystery!
Essentially The House of Eternal Return is a dream come true for anyone who enjoys psychedelic art. At Burning Man and the Oregon Country Fair Tom and I have enjoyed a variety of psychedelic, interactive art pieces, but those are all temporary, which limits their scope. Meow Wolf is a permanent museum with a full staff, which allows the artists to create advanced immersive art that is completely interactive (you can touch and play with everything you see at Meow Wolf)!
Need a place to stay in Santa Fe? Check out this amazing Santa Fe Airbnb!
Meow Wolf tickets and advice
Getting tickets to Meow Wolf is simple, you can either purchase them online in advance or you can purchase them at the exhibit when you arrive. The ticket line can get long so we recommend purchasing your tickets in advance. Meow Wolf’s prices felt very reasonable considering that you can easily spend an entire day exploring. Tickets are $20 per adult, with discounts available for children and seniors.
You cannot bring any food or drink into The House of Eternal Return, but your ticket is a wrist band that allows you in and out access to the exhibit all day long. There are food trucks in the parking lot, and plenty of water fountains in the Meow Wolf lobby. Entering and exiting the exhibit is quick and easy, so it’s no problem to visit without a water bottle.
You will climb, crawl, and walk a LOT at Meow Wolf so dress accordingly! When planning your visit you may want to look up the Meow Wolf events calendar for the dates you plan to visit. Meow Wolf regularly hosts awesome concerts, and the exhibit is often open during the shows so you can explore the House of Eternal Return, AND dance the night away.
Meow Wolf’s hours:
Sunday, Monday, Wednesday, Thursday: 10am- 8pm
Friday and Saturday: 10am- 10pm
CLOSED Tuesdays
We had very high expectations for Meow Wolf, and The House of Eternal Return managed to exceed those expectations! We are already scheming up a plan to return to Meow Wolf with a group of our Burning Man friends. Meow Wolf is an experience we feel compelled to share with others, and one that we hope you will experience for yourself!
Unfortunately there are not many camping options in the city center of Santa Fe, and it’s really nice to be able to walk to Meow Wolf. This may be the perfect time to splurge on a hotel room for a couple nights!
After Meow Wolf be sure to visit Bandelier National Monument outside Santa Fe, it’s a beautiful camping spot!
We visited Meow Wolf as part of our full time camper travels across North America! Want to read more about our travels? Check out the top 10 reasons we love camper life or read why we think Baja, Mexico is the ultimate road trip through paradise!
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Meow Wolf looks soo interesting! It’s one of the places that I’m most excited to see once we hit the road. It’s also really cool that it was funded by George R.R Martin… aside from creating Game of Thrones, he’s also a deadhead! What a cool dude he must be.
I had no idea he was a deadhead! Makes total sense actually… 🙂 Meow Wolf was WILD, and so awesome. I even had dreams about it afterwards!