The Wave Organ mentioned above is a project associated with the Exploratorium, which is highly recommended to all geeks with an ounce of cool in their misshapen cerebellums. This is the country's first interactive science museum, ostensibly for kids... It's built inside an enormous, dark air-craft hanger style building, and it's littered with funky creations that are supposedly designed to give you some sort of hands-on access to some scientific principle, though the actual educational value often seems dubious. On a typical visit, you can:
- Get nauseous spinning around on a turn table while twisting a bike wheel gyroscope.
- Create artificial lightning in the spark gap apparatus intended to show something or other about the shape of electrodes.
- Play "music" on a white-key only piano keyboard, with a user-selectable tuning system.
- A hell of a lot more. Trust me.
The place's only flaws are that it's a little expensive for a day pass (they ask $14 for adults, $11 for students), and it closes kind of early (10am-5pm, Tuesdays-Sunday). Note: free admission on first Wednesdays of every month. But if you can get over there early enough, I guarantee you'll get your money's worth out of it.
There's a reference to the Exploratorium site below.