BugFest

BugFest is the largest bug-centered event of its kind in the country, it is free, and it takes over the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences and the streets around it for a full nine hours.

The scale is the thing people underestimate. This is not a museum putting on a themed weekend. It is more than 100 exhibits, entomologists taking questions all day, and a crowd that runs into the tens of thousands.

What you will find:

• More than 100 exhibits across the museum and outside it
• Entomologists answering questions in person
• Cafe Insecta, where the food contains actual insects and the line is long anyway
• A different featured bug order each year
• Hands-on activities aimed squarely at children

Practical advice, because this is the busiest free family event of the Raleigh fall:

• Arrive at opening or after 3 p.m. The middle of the day is the crush.
• Park further out than feels necessary and walk in
• Agree a meeting point with older children before you go in

Our read: the reason BugFest works where a lot of science outreach does not is that it refuses to be dignified about it. Children come for the tarantulas and the insect cooking, and the entomology arrives while they are already interested.

Free, which for an event of this size is remarkable.