Odessa Meteor Crater

Very chill and lowkey experience. The guy at the visitor’s center/museum was very nice. Interesting background on the crater going back to the 1920s explained on the wall with meteorite fragments all around. The crater itself is kind of lack luster. Most of it has been filled in and the path you take to walk around it probably takes 5-7 minutes at a leisurely pace. There’s some interesting informational signs along the walk and some cool solar system signs on the drive out showing you how far away everything is relative to the sun at the museum. It doesn’t take long to stop here, so maybe pop by if you’re around. Not a must-see, but also not nothing.

This place was interesting, informing museum of rocks, photos, & a cool trail to walk with signs of information. If you want there are a couple of spots in the front to grill food.

If you come, don't expect to walk into a deep crater because it has been mostly filled in over the many years since this was created. However, there is a trail that allows you to walk over the filled in areas with historical information from the research that was done many years ago. The trail leads you into and around the outer edge of the crater and into a museum. I was surprised that the museum was opened on July 4th. Inside you can read more about the crater, see artifacts, and learn more about the site.

I can't evaluate the museum, because we were there on Memorial Day, & the museum is always closed on Mondays. I enjoyed seeing the plants and lizards, so different than what I see in Pennsylvania. There were a number of wildflowers blooming, possibly due to thunderstorms the previous day or so. The Crater itself isn't overwhelming, because it has filled in considerably from the elements. And yet I still found it intriguing.

Located just outside of Odessa, TX, 3 miles South of I-20. It was very easy to locate, and is well worth the visit if you are in the area. Unlike the Barringer Crater in AZ, this is not a family owned cash grab. It's free admission, has a small, but interesting museum, and they rely heavily on donations and sales to maintain the place. The site actually has two impact craters, one which is completely filled in and one that is mostly filled. They have a footpath around the crater rim area with plenty of informational signs. As you leave the site, there are signs designating the bodies of our solar system. It's crazy to think about the scale of it. The inner rocky planets and sun were all located within about 200 feet of another, and three miles later there's Pluto.

Odessa Meteor Crater is a gem more for the outstanding museum than even the large 550 crater ring and trail around it. This, 63,000,000 crater has been greatly filled in by dirt over time, but it is still very discernable. The museum has an amazing group of meteorites from around the world. NO CHARGE for visiting. It is non-profit and deserves strong support. A bonus is the adjacent smaller 2nd meteor crater.

It was interesting to stop just on the way and spend half of an hour walking around the crater, but it would not be worth doing a special trip for that at all. I was there in May, and the temperature outside was +105F, but they do not have any drinking water fountain inside the building. So it better be awared and get something to drink with you. Also if you decide to buy a T-sort from their little museum shop it is better to have some cash with you because they don't take any cards. By the way, the one-room museum was pretty nice and interesting, although a guy in there was extremely unhospitable and answered only "Yes, sir." "No, sir" and "I can not, sir."

Very cool place to visit and they have a great meteorite collection.