Meow Wolf

West of downtown Santa Fe, New Mexico towards the strip malls, chain stores, and old neon-lit motels, is a thing called Meow Wolf. I call it a thing because I’m not quite sure what it is and that’s after crawling through refrigerators, blue time tunnels, and playing musical mastodons. The amount of ingenuity per square foot is astounding.

There’s a detective story loosely connected to Meow Wolf. Immerse-ants will find private correspondence referring to all kinds of mysterious events. Feel free to open drawers or snoop in cabinets, cues are scattered everywhere but with so many people wandering around gaping at the strangeness it’s hard to get a look at them all. I sort of tried to follow the story but it will take several visits to figure it out. If you want to solve the story go to Meow Wolf when nobody is blocking your progress.

Besides the back story, Meow Wolf can stand alone if you don’t want to tax your brain trying to slot Lex’s school reprimand letter into the narrative. Nothing is what it seems to be so just wander around opening portals and being amazed at the way normal life can be altered by slight shifts in reality. It reminds me of that Monkees movie, Head.

Be prepared to crawl around on your hands and knees and push or pull on everything. At least half the stuff leads to somewhere else. One second you’re in a traditional living room, the next a spacecraft. If you can fit inside it goes somewhere cool. I loved the place and it’s given me many ideas on how to make our house forever un-sellable with a few modifications.

The closest things to Meow Wolf in the real world are those McDonald land playhouses found at suburban McDonald’s restaurants, except that Meow Wolf is not as sticky. They must have a crack janitorial crew. After two and a half hours I had use one of the many exits to make sure I wasn’t stuck in there. It’s artwork that you enter and sign in please, then try to imagine why it exists.

Next time you visit Santa Fe, New Mexico, visit Meow Wolf. There is talk of replicating Meow Wolf in Las Vegas, Nevada. I’m sure the Vegas one will be overdone and flashy but I like the little mom and pop alternate realities better.