Houston

The magnificent pink mansion in the marshy elbow of Buffalo Bayou in Houston's River Oaks area was the home of Miss Ima Hogg, a woman much loved in the community until her death in 1975, at the age of 93. Miss Hogg and her two brothers bought the woodlands estate in 1925 and for two years, Miss Hogg worked on the gardens. At her death, Miss Hogg left her home and the gardens surrounding it as a legacy for the city.The house contains a remarkable collection of Americana dating from 1620 to 1870 and is regarded as a cultural treasure, with several thousand objects displayed in 28 period room settings in the mansion. Miss Hogg designed the gardens as outdoor living rooms, fed by bayou waters, and today they continue to provide a peaceful oasis in the middle of the metropolis planted with indigenous species. Dedicated teams work on the gardens to preserve and enhance them. Amongst the improvements made is the garden's conversion into an entirely organic space. The gardens were the first 100 percent organic gardens in the state of Texas.

Address : 6003 Memorial Drive at Westcott Street

E-mail : [email protected]

Website : www.mfah.org/bayoubend

Telephone : (713) 639 7750

Opening times : $15 adults, free for children.

Admission : Tuesday-Thursday 10am-5pm, Sunday 1pm-5pm, closed Monday.

The visitor's Space Center is attached to the headquarters of America's manned space programme, Nasa's 'Mission Control' that directs the space shuttle project and guided the pioneering astronauts. The Space Center, Houston's most popular tourist attraction, is located at Clear Lake, 20 miles (32km) southeast of downtown, off the Gulf freeway I-45.There are numerous wonders to behold at this facility, which both entertains and educates, from a mock-up of a space shuttle to an Imax theatre and hundreds of hands-on exhibits. Visitors are taken through the NASA Johnson Space Center where engineers are at work, and some lucky visitors might even get to see astronauts training and preparing for a mission.The Feel of Space exhibit gives visitors an idea of what it's like to carry out everyday tasks in a low-gravity environment, and there is even an opportunity for visitors to practice some basic astronaut skills on simulators, such as landing the orbiter. Tram tours run every half hour taking in the highlights, including Rocket Park where retired spacecraft come to rest, Mission Control and even astronauts in training.

Address : 1601 NASA Parkway

Website : www.spacecenter.org

Telephone : (281) 483 0123

Set within a scenic part of central Houston is the city's Museum District, featuring 19 varied institutions and numerous restaurants set among some lovely green spaces like Hermann Park, all within a 1.5 mile radius of the Mecom Fountain. One of the highlights in the area is the Byzantine Fresco Chapel on the corner of Branard and Yupon Streets, containing 13th-century frescoes from Cyprus. There is also a children's museum, contemporary arts museum, and the Houston Holocaust Museum.One of the most interesting museums in the district is the Museum of Health and Medical Science, which features a walk-through re-creation of the human body. The Menil Museum has a collection of contemporary, surrealistic, and 20th century art in an interesting building at Sul Ross. In Hermann Park is the comprehensive Museum of Natural Science and Planetarium, the Houston Zoo and a Japanese Garden.Further museums included in the district are the Asia Society, Buffalo Soldiers National Museum, Czech Center Museum Houston, Houston Center for Contemporary Craft, Houston Center for Photography, the John C. Freeman Weather Museum, the Jung Center of Houston, Lawndale Art Center, Museum of African-American Culture, the Rice University Art Gallery, and the Rothko Chapel.

Website : www.houstonmuseumdistrict.org

At Barren Springs near Houston's International Airport is an unusual private museum run by a major funeral company in the United States, dedicated to funeral memorabilia. It is the largest museum dedicated to funerary practices in the Unites States, and probably the world.Customs, rituals, and traditions associated with burial from ancient Egypt to the present day are represented in this institution. Highlights of the collection are restored horse-drawn and vintage automobile hearses, and a unique 1916 Packard funeral bus. The museum also features a gallery devoted to the funerals of the famous, containing memorabilia from the funerals of Elvis Presley, John F. Kennedy, and Rudolph Valentino.Some of the permanent exhibits that can be viewed at the museum are Celebrating the Lives and Deaths of the Popes, a History of Embalming, 19th Century Mourning Customs, Presidential Funerals, Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, Reflections on the Wall, Coffins and Caskets of the Past, Ghana and Fantasy Coffins and Japanese Funerals. The museum sponsors an annual golf tournament in May, as well as an annual Halloween Classic Car Show.

Address : 415 Barren Springs Drive

Website : www.nmfh.org

Telephone : (281) 876 3063

Opening times : Monday to Friday 10am-4pm, Saturday 10am-5pm, Sunday 12pm-4pm

The Sam Houston Historical Park near the city's visitor centre in Bagby Street provides visitors with a large as life look at Houston history. The 19-acre park features seven of the city's oldest buildings that have been restored and relocated here.The oldest building is a small 1823 cabin that originally stood at Clear Lake, while one of the more recent is the 17-room home built in 1905 for oil field pioneer Henry T. Staiti. Some of the other buildings located in the park are the 1847 Kellum-Noble House, the 1850 Nichols-Rice-Cherry House, the 1868 San Felipe House, the 1868 Pillot house, the 1891 St. John Church, the 1870 Yates House and the 4th Ward Cottage. Each building has been renovated and furnished to appear exactly as it would have when it was first erected.The park itself was bough by a mayour of the city in 1900, and was carefully landscaped into a beautiful Victorian garden. Several sculptures and memorials are displayed permanently in the park, such as the Neuhaus Fountain, the Alexander Hodge Memorial, the World War I Memorial and the spirit of the Confederacy sculpture. Visitors to the park today can explore each of the houses as well as the garden

Address : 1100 Bagby Street

Website : www.houstontx.gov/parks/parksites/samhoustonpark.html

Telephone : +832 394 8805

Opening times : Daily 7am-7pm

For a touch of the bizarre call at the Orange Show to see how obsession can become art. A former postman spent 26 years of his life assembling a collection of weird and wonderful objects and meshing them together into a labyrinth of passages and staircases, almost all of it orange. The result is a quirky curiosity, which is billed as 'folk art', and has spawned the popular Art Car Parade, a city-wide parade of cars decorated in weird and wonderful ways.Several other sites are included in the Orange show, such as the Beer Can House - a house covered entirely in so-called siding made from beer cans, and decorated with garlands made from beer cans. the house was covered i beer cans by a retired upholsterer, for fun. There is also currently another park under construction, called Smither Park, that will follow the aesthetics and philosophy of the Orange Show. The park is billed as Houston's first folk-inspired green space and will play host to city-dwellers' leisure time as well as personal ceremonies such as weddings. Public performances and shows are also planned for the space.

Address : 2402 Munger Street

Website : www.orangeshow.org