El Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales en Madrid
The National Museum of Natural Sciences (MNCN in Spanish) is situated in Calle José Gutiérrez Abascal, 2, in Madrid. It hosts an important collection of geological and zoological pieces.
The museum opens Tuesday to Friday from 10am to 6pm. Sundays and public holidays it only opens in the morning from 10am to 2.30pm.
The MNCN only exhibits part of its massive collection of over 8 million specimens. In the rooms open to the public there are nearly 200 mammals and almost one million birds from the five continents, with specimens as surprising as the Filipino Cockatoo or the proboscis monkey.
This centre has seven permanent exhibitions. One of the most visited ones is the exhibition of minerals, fossils and human evolution. Through rocks and stones the museum helps us understand 450 million years of the history of the planet Earth.
One of the symbols of the museum is the gigantic skeleton of a rorqual whale over 20 metres long and that weighs over 1,500 kg, kept in the Biology room.
The ticket price is 5 Euros, and reduced tickets are 3 Euros for children between 4-14 years of age, unemployed visitors and students.