St. Louis for Under $50: Two Kids, Two Adults, One Sunday

0) Your details

1) At a glance

1b) Our recommendation, and the best alternative

Recommended: Zoo in the morning, picnic on Art Hill, Art Museum quick hit, playground finish, custard on the drive home. Reasons: the Zoo is the single biggest free wow in the country for a 5-year-old and an 8-year-old, it opens at 9:00 AM so you get two cool, uncrowded hours before the strollers arrive, and everything else on the list sits inside the same park, so you never pay to move the car. Forest Park has free street parking and free Visitor Center lots, which is the whole trick: last year's $80 morning was mostly a paid lot plus impulse ride tickets, and both of those are avoidable.

Best alternative (rain, heat, or tired legs): Science Center plus Planetarium side, then the playground. The Science Center's general admission is always free, it is indoors, and the walk across the Sky Bridge over the highway between the Planetarium and the main building is free entertainment that kids talk about for weeks. Park free on the Forest Park side by the Planetarium instead of paying $15 in the Oakland lot.

1c) Book now

2) Day-by-day plan

Sunday, September 13, 2026: the $50 day

8:45 AM, arrive and park for free. Aim for street parking inside Forest Park along Government Drive and Fine Arts Drive, near the Zoo's North Entrance at the intersection of Fine Arts Drive and Government Drive. The Zoo's own parking page confirms that limited street parking for personal vehicles is available in Forest Park, and that its own lots cost $20 per car for non-members, cashless only, from February 27, 2026. Backup free parking: the Visitor and Education Center lots and Grand Drive, both free. Open in maps ↗

💡 Tip: the Zoo lots use a pull-a-ticket, pay-by-QR system, so nobody stops you at the entrance and you can accidentally "park first, discover the $20 later". If you end up in a Zoo lot anyway, that single decision is 40 percent of today's budget.

9:00 AM to 11:30 AM, Saint Louis Zoo, free. 1 Government Drive, St. Louis, MO 63110, phone (314) 781-0900. Open 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM on your date. Free means free: all the animal houses, the hippos, penguins, elephants, big cats, sea lion pool viewing and the playground-ish splash spots included. What is NOT included: the Conservation Carousel, Zooline Railroad, 4D Theater, Dinoroarus, Stingrays at Caribbean Cove, the Wild Explorer VR and giraffe feedings. Those are the paid attractions, bundled in the Adventure Pass (roughly $13 to $17 per person in recent seasons, confirm on the official pass page, children under 2 free). Four passes would be $52 or more, so today they are a polite "no thanks". Open in maps ↗

💡 Tip: brief the kids in the car, on the way in, that today is an animal day and not a rides day. Announcing it before they see the carousel is the difference between a shrug and a negotiation.

11:30 AM to 12:15 PM, picnic on Art Hill, free. Walk up from the Grand Basin to the grass in front of the Art Museum. Shade, skyline view, room to roll down the hill, and zero table fees. Water fountains and public restrooms are inside the Art Museum and the Visitor Center.

12:15 PM to 1:15 PM, Saint Louis Art Museum, free. One Fine Arts Drive, Forest Park. Admission to the museum is free every day, Sunday hours are 10:00 AM to 5:00 PM. Free covers the main collection galleries. Ticketed special exhibitions are the exception and they are only free on Fridays, so on a Sunday just skip the special show and stay in the permanent galleries. Open in maps ↗

💡 Tip: with a 5-year-old, one hour is the whole museum. Give each kid a three-item scavenger hunt (a mummy, a horse, something gold) and leave while they still like it.

1:30 PM to 2:45 PM, Variety Wonderland Playground, free. Next to the Dennis & Judith Jones Visitor and Education Center at 5595 Grand Drive, St. Louis, MO 63112. Fully accessible, sensory panels, a merry-go-round that fits wheelchairs, and shade. Free parking on Grand Drive or in the Visitor Center lots. Second choice if it is packed: the Oakland Avenue Playground on the south side of the park, with its climbable turtle theme, also free.

💡 Tip: this is your reset button before the drive. Run them here, not at 4:00 PM when everyone is done.

3:00 PM, Ted Drewes Frozen Custard, the one paid item. 6726 Chippewa St, St. Louis, MO 63109, phone (314) 481-2652, the Route 66 stand opens at 11:00 AM. About 5 miles from Forest Park, roughly 13 minutes. It is a walk-up window, so no table service and no 15 to 20 percent tip expected, just the tip jar if you feel generous. Prices at the window are not posted online; the official bulk price for an 8 oz mini is $3.75 per cup, and walk-up sizes run in the roughly $4 to $7 range plus tax, so confirm at the window. Order strategy that keeps the receipt tidy: two minis for the kids, two small concretes for the adults, one straw each, done. Open in maps ↗

💡 Tip: pay attention at the window, a large concrete is roughly a small bucket of custard. Two smalls plus two minis genuinely feeds four people.

Plan B if it rains or hits 95 degrees: swap the Zoo morning for the Saint Louis Science Center, 5050 Oakland Avenue, general admission always free. Park free on the Forest Park side near the James S. McDonnell Planetarium and walk the Sky Bridge over I-64 into the main building, instead of paying $15 in the Oakland lot. Free covers the hands-on exhibit floors and the bridge. Paid extras are the OMNIMAX films, Planetarium shows and the Discovery Room sessions, so budget zero and enjoy the free floors. No outside food is allowed inside the building, so eat your picnic in the park before you cross. Open in maps ↗

💡 Tip: the Planetarium building sits in Forest Park itself, so on a drizzly day you can park once, do the Science Center, and still reach the playground without paying a cent for parking.

2b) Experiences and free offers

Free and donation-based first, and this list is deliberately short, because a $50 cap and a booked paid tour do not fit in the same day.

Honest line on bookable tours: for this specific day we are not recommending any paid guided experience. A family-of-four ticket on any platform starts around $60 to $100, which is more than your entire budget, and St. Louis hands you world-class free attractions instead. That is not a gap in the plan, that is the plan.

3) Practical notes and checklist

The upsell map, so nothing ambushes you

Checklist

• Packed picnic, plus one extra snack per kid for the 2:30 PM meltdown window
• Refillable water bottles, September in St. Louis can still hit the high 80s
• Sunscreen and hats, Art Hill has no shade
• Card or phone for Ted Drewes and for parking if you end up in a paid lot, the Zoo lots are cashless
• Stroller or wagon for the 5-year-old, the Zoo is 90 acres
• Closed-toe shoes for the playground
• Screenshot of the Zoo map, free paper maps are also at both entrances
• Check Forest Park closures the night before

Cost overview against your $50 cap

Honest budget reality: the only way this day goes over $50 is a parking gate or a ride ticket. Zoo lot $20 plus Science Center lot $15 is $35 of pure avoidable cost, and four Adventure Passes would be $52 on their own. Free street parking in Forest Park is limited and it fills up, so the 8:45 AM arrival is not a suggestion, it is the budget. If every free spot is genuinely gone, the cheaper of the two paid options is the Science Center Oakland lot at $15 rather than the Zoo lot at $20, and you would still land near $47.

Car-free alternative, for the record: MetroLink to the Forest Park/DeBaliviere station, then MetroBus route #90 Hampton south, which stops a short walk from the Zoo's North Entrance at Fine Arts Drive and Government Drive. Fares are in the low single dollars per adult one-way, buy at the station machine or in the Metro app, confirm the current fare at metrostlouis.org. For a family of four coming in by car, free park-and-walk still wins on price.

4) Sources

Attractions and hours (checked June 2026)

• Saint Louis Zoo, hours and free admission: https://stlzoo.org/visit/hours-and-prices
• Saint Louis Zoo, parking fees, street parking, transit: https://stlzoo.org/visit/parking-and-maps
• Saint Louis Zoo, Adventure Pass contents and terms: https://stlzoo.org/attractions/adventure-pass
• Saint Louis Art Museum, hours and free admission: https://www.slam.org/hours-location-parking/
• Saint Louis Science Center, parking price: https://www.slsc.org/visit/directions-parking/
• Saint Louis Science Center, free admission, Sky Bridge, food policy: https://www.slsc.org/visit/faqs/
• Saint Louis Science Center, hours: https://www.slsc.org/visit/hours/
• Missouri History Museum, hours and directions: https://mohistory.org/society/hours-and-directions
• City Museum, tickets and add-ons: https://citymuseum.org/tickets-memberships/

Park, playground and parking

• Forest Park Forever, Visitor and Education Center, free parking: https://www.forestparkforever.org/visitor-center
• Forest Park Forever, park navigation and map: https://www.forestparkforever.org/navigation
• City of St. Louis Parks, Forest Park amenities: https://www.stlouis-mo.gov/parks/parks/browse-parks/view-park.cfm?parkID=1&parkName=Forest+Park

Food

• Ted Drewes Frozen Custard, Chippewa location, phone, opening time, bulk pricing: https://teddrewes.com/local-pickup/
• Ted Drewes locations: https://teddrewes.com/locations/
• Ted Drewes menu: https://teddrewes.com/menu/

Transit

• Metro St. Louis, MetroLink and MetroBus fares and schedules: https://www.metrostlouis.org/

All facts above as of June 2026. Prices and hours can change, and Forest Park road closures for events are the one thing worth re-checking the night before.