KidzCity in Woodland Hills

KidzCity, Inc is a licensed play, educational and party center where you can safely drop your kids off or stay, chat or work in our work rooms for no extra charge. KidzCity offers a variety of kids' activities, including video games, ping pong, air hockey, foosball, board games, toys, dress up activities and more.

Open on no school days and holidays for fun play and activities, as well Parents' Night Outs on Fridays, camps, after school programs, birthday parties and more. All ages, including adults. Located at 22325 Dolorosa Street, Woodland Hills (Ventura Blvd and Shoup).

More info at kidzcity.co or 818.887.7516.

101 Warriors Youth Football and Cheer in Westlake Village

The 101 Youth Football and Cheer and its predecessor organizations having been serving the families of players and cheerleaders in the greater Conejo Valley for over 30 years.

Registration for football and cheer in the fall each year. Member of the Gold Coast Youth Football Leagues. Football participation based on age and weight at www.101-warriors.org.

• Mighty Mite: Ages 6 to 8

• Bantam: Ages 8 to 10

• Freshman: Ages 9 to 11

• Sophomore: Ages 10 to 12

• Junior: Ages 11 to 13

• Senior: Ages 12 to 14

Cheer participation is for girls ages 6 to 14, focusing on cheers, dances and stunts performed on the sideline and midfield at halftime during 101 Warrior football games.

More information at www.101-warriors.org.

Alameda Park in Santa Barbara

Ranking high up on the list of parks with cool play areas around town is Alameda Park, located at the corner of Garden Street and E. Micheltorena Street in Santa Barbara. Alameda Park has an 8,000 sq ft mostly wooden play structure that was built by local residents.

Your kids will fall in love with the nooks, crannies, steps, bridges and places to hide in this play structure. There are also swings and things to climb on. The park itself is 2 blocks long and one of the oldest parks in Santa Barbara. It is next door to the beautiful Alice Keck Park Memorial Garden. Plenty of grass, spectacular, large shade trees and much more make this a perfect picnic lunch stop when you're in town.

More information at www.santabarbaraca.gov/gov/depts/parksrec/parks/features/horticulture/alameda.asp.

Free Airplane Rides for Kids in Camarillo and Santa Paula

Each month, Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA) Chapter 723 offers free flights to youth ages 8 through 17, weather permitting.

The EAA Young Eagles program was launched in 1992 to give young people the opportunity to fly in a general aviation airplane. EAA volunteers will explain what you will see and do pre-flight, then take you on a 15 to 20 minute flight. After the flight, your pilot will present you with your own Young Eagles logbook, along with an entry for the flight.

In Camarillo, flights take place from the EAA Hangar Area at 501 Aviation Drive at the Camarillo Airport on the first Saturday of the month. Look for signs; it is next to Commemorative Air Force, CAF Museum, and near the Animal Shelter. Please park on the street, Aviation Way. DO NOT PARK in the CAF Parking Lot.

In Santa Paula, flights are from Santa Paula Airport and take place on the first Sunday of each month. Look for signs.

Visit chapters.eaa.org/eaa723/young-eagles/eagles-flights for more information.

So Cal Field Hockey Federation

The So Cal Field Federation is a non-profit organization supporting the development of field hockey in Southern California, from youth to international level competition. Based in Thousand Oaks and games at Moorpark College. Local teams include the Conejo Valley Bulldogs, Simi Valley Kings, Moorpark Coyotes, Ventura Roadrunners and Ventura County Red Devils.

FHF has teams for ages U8 and up for youth, adults, males and females!  Youth Field Hockey Spring sign-ups take place in January for the Spring season.

For more information and links to each team, visit www.socalfieldhockey.com.

Sky Zone Thousand Oaks at Janss Marketplace

Sky Zone Thousand Oaks (formerly Defy Extreme Air Sports and formerly DojoBoom) opened at Janss Marketplace in Thousand Oaks on November 3, 2017. (and became Defy in late 2019 and Sky Zone in late July 2022).

Offering over 50,000 sq. feet of fun, including walll to wall trampolines, free style jump, skyslam, ultimate dodgeball, foam zone, skyhoops, rock wall, and much more.

Open 9am to 9pm.

Birthday party packages available. 

Learn more at www.skyzone.com/thousandoaks call 805.410.4690.

Chase Palm Park in Santa Barbara

Chase Palm Park in Santa Barbara is a huge park that sandwiches East Cabrillo Boulevard.  On the ocean side of Cabrillo the park consists of a palm-lined, narrow strip of park adjacent to East Beach with an oceanfront bike path and walkway from Stearns Wharf to East Beach.  This side of the park is host to Sunday/holiday arts and crafts shows.  The 14,600 square foot Skater's Point skate park is also located on this side of the park.

Call 805.564.5418 for more information or visit www.santabarbaraca.gov/gov/depts/parksrec/parks/features/playgrounds/chase.asp.

On the other side of Cabrillo is a huge 10 acre parcel that features fountains, creeks, a lagoon, carousel, snack bar and a shipwreck playground modeled after an ocean schooner from the turn of the century.

The park is walking distance to Stearns Wharf, the beach, bike rentals, State Street, etc.

From 1999 to 2017, the park was home to a vintage 1916 40 foot in diamater carousel, The carousel was relocated to Fort Hood, Oregon to a museum.

Ventura County Library System

The Ventura County Library System includes 12 community branch libraries and a museum library.

The system offers books, magazines, book and music CDs, eBooks, audio books, streamable music, DVDs and more. A list of locations in the system is below. Visit the library website at www.vencolibrary.org for an online catalog and more information.

Your library card also gives you access to newspapers, language instruction, auto repair, genealogy resources and career tools. All of that, and there’s even more: find early literacy resources, encyclopedias, test preparation and biography, literature, science, and history databases.

The VC Library's online eLibrary is available 24/7 at www.vencolibrary.org/elibrary. Here is a sampling of apps available in the eLibrary:

• Hoopla - streaming of movies, TV shows and albums

• For eBook downloads, they offer CloudLibrary (popular fiction/nonfiction eAudiobooks), BookFLIX (for beginning readers with read-aloud feature), EBSCOhost eBooks (adult nonfiction) and others.

To check out books at the libraries and obtain materials online, you'll need to obtain a library card at any of the libraries in the Ventura County Library system. The initial card is free.

Libraries in the system are as follows (additional details at www.vencolibrary.org/locations).

Avenue Library, 606 North Ventura Avenue, Ventura (805.643.6393)

Fillmore Library, 502 Second Street, Fillmore (805.524.3355)

E.P Foster Library, 651 East Main Street, Ventura (805.648.2716)

Hill Road Library, 1070 S. Hill Road, Ventura (805.677.7180)

Museum of Ventura County Historical Research Library (805.653.0323)

Meiners Oaks Library, 114 North Padre Juan, Ojai (805.646.4804)

Oak Park Library, 899 North Kanan Road, Oak Park (818.889.2239)

Oak View Library, 555 Mahoney Avenue, Oak View (805.649.1523)

Ojai Library, 111 East Ojai Avenue, Ojai (805.646.1639)

Piru Library, 3811 Center Street, Piru (805.521.1753)

Ray D. Prueter Library, 510 Park Avenue, Port Hueneme (805.486.5460)

Saticoy Library, 1292 Los Angeles Avenue, Ventura (805.671.5148)

Albert H. Soliz Library (El Rio), 2820 Jourdan Street, Oxnard (805.485.4515)

Although the VC Library System does not prefer this, you can check out books from one library in the system and return them to another one. 

The following libraries in Ventura County and nearby areas are run by municipalities and thus are not part of the Ventura County Library System. You can check out books at these other libraries but will need separate library cards at them.

• Simi Valley Library

• Thousand Oaks and Newbury Park Libraries

• Moorpark City Library

• Camarillo Public Library

• Agoura Hills Library and Westlake Village Library (members of the Los Angeles County Library System)

Camarillo Youth Basketball Association

The Camarillo Youth Basketball Association consists of a recreational league of boys in grades 3 to 8 and a high school league

There is also a girls “junior” league for grades 3 to 5 and “senior” league for grades 6 to 8.

More information at www.cybaonline.org or 805.482.6680.

Marina Park in Ventura

Marina Park is located at 2950 Pierpont Boulevard in Ventura (near the intersection of Pierpont and Coral Street). It is a 15 acre park that has over a third of a mile of oceanfront adjacent to Ventura Harbor, giving it plenty of beachfront, flat sand to play in.

There is also a kids play area (geared toward younger kids), plenty of grass, restrooms and more. There is also a water taxi and a fishing dock. Fun destination park in the Ventura Keys. We never go wrong bringing the kids here. More info at www.cityofventura.net/parks.

The zip line attached to the "San Salvador" ship was taken down in 2016. The city indicates there is a possibility it will be replaced if a safe alternative can be identified.

Newer pirate-themed play area at Marina Park (re-done in 2012).

Nice, protected beachfront area at Marina Park

The popular San Salvador at Marina Park.

This popular zip line was taken down in 2016; the city indicates the possibility of identifying a new, safe zip line possibility but as of September 2019 no specific timing available.