Author: Luke Mitchell

Eleven slides, a surf simulator and the longest indoor lazy river in North Texas, all under a roof that opens when the weather is nice. Epic Waters in Grand Prairie beats the heat any day. Here is how to do it. A DFW summer can make an outdoor waterpark feel like a mistake by noon. Epic Waters solves that. The Grand Prairie indoor waterpark packs 80,000 square feet of slides, pools and a lazy river under a climate-controlled, retractable roof, so it is comfortable in July heat and open in January cold alike. It is not a small operation, either.…

A museum many critics call one of the finest buildings in America, holding art most cities would kill for and the permanent collection costs nothing. The Kimbell in Fort Worth is a gift. Here is how to do it. Fort Worth’s Cultural District is stacked with great museums, but the Kimbell Art Museum is the crown. It pairs a small, exquisite collection with what architects widely consider one of the most beautiful museum buildings ever made and the best part is the price: seeing the permanent collection is completely free, any day it is open. This is the rare world-class…

The Cowboys’ billion-dollar home in Arlington is on the global stage for the 2026 World Cup, which means tours are paused for the summer. Here is the timing and how to do the tour right when it reopens. AT&T Stadium is the kind of building you have to see from the inside at least once. The Dallas Cowboys’ home in Arlington is a 100,000-plus-capacity engineering showpiece and in the summer of 2026 it is on the world’s biggest stage as a host venue for the FIFA World Cup. That global moment comes with a catch for locals: the stadium’s popular…

The Ewing mansion from the most famous TV show ever set in Dallas is a real ranch in Parker and you can walk right through it. Here is how to do the Southfork tour right. Before there was a Dallas you streamed, there was the Dallas the whole world watched. The primetime soap about the scheming Ewing oil family ran for over a decade and made one house famous on every continent. That house, Southfork Ranch, is a real property in Parker, just northeast of the city and it is open for tours. This is gloriously campy, only-in-Texas tourism and…

The biggest zoo in Texas hides in South Dallas, with the only koalas in the state, a hand-feeding giraffe deck and a monorail through the African wilds. Here is how to actually do it right. The Dallas Zoo is the largest zoo in Texas and a lot of locals still have not been since they were kids. That is a mistake. Spread across 106 acres in South Dallas, it is a legitimate half-day adventure with a couple of experiences you genuinely cannot get anywhere else in the state. This is not a quick walk past some cages. Between the giraffe-feeding…

The Cool Thursdays Concert Series turns 29 this year, and it is still the best-value summer night on White Rock Lake. Here is how to actually do it right. Most people think of the Dallas Arboretum as a daytime, bring-the-kids, look-at-the-tulips kind of place. It is that. But on Thursday nights from June through November, the 66-acre garden on the east shore of White Rock Lake turns into one of the best outdoor concert venues in the city, and most locals still sleep on it. The Cool Thursdays Concert Series hits its 29th season in 2026, which makes it one…

The most consequential hour in Dallas history happened at one downtown intersection, and the museum that tells it is built inside the building where it started. Here is how to do the Sixth Floor right. Every Dallas local has driven through Dealey Plaza. Most have never gone up. The Sixth Floor Museum sits inside the old Texas School Book Depository at 411 Elm Street, on the exact floor where the shots that killed President John F. Kennedy were fired on November 22, 1963, and it is one of the most quietly powerful hours you can spend in the city. This…

Dallas built a park over a freeway and somehow made it feel like the most natural thing in the world. If you have lived here for any amount of time and still have not spent a real afternoon at Klyde Warren Park you are genuinely missing one of the best free things this city has to offer. A Park in a City This Busy Klyde Warren Park sits at 2012 Woodall Rodgers Freeway in Dallas right between Uptown and the Arts District. It opened in 2012 and was built on a deck over the sunken Woodall Rodgers Freeway which means…

Down The Block The Fort Worth Museum of Science and History has become more than a school field trip stop. It is evolving into one of the most strategic cultural anchors in North Texas. Families are not just visiting. They are building routines around it. Located in the Cultural District, the museum sits steps from the Will Rogers complex and across from the National Cowgirl Museum. Its footprint feels expansive the moment you walk up to the glass façade. Inside, the air hums with conversation and moving exhibits. This is not a nostalgia play. It is a modern institution leaning…

There is a reason locals default to the Fort Worth Zoo when someone asks what to do this weekend. It is not nostalgia. It is not habit. It is because it consistently delivers a full day that feels elevated, organized, and worth the price of admission. In a city that is expanding fast and rebranding itself by the month, the Fort Worth Zoo remains one of the few institutions that feels both established and current. It is not trying to be trendy. It simply is. A Zoo That Operates Like an Anchor The Fort Worth Zoo first opened in 1909…