Pioneertown is a convincing step back into the Old West. Built as a movie set in 1946, Gene Autry’s films were shot here, as were those starring the Cisco Kid and Annie Oakley. Your kids will love kicking up dust along Mane Street with its liveries and wagons and hitching posts, and they’ll get an even bigger kick out of the Wild West gunfights staged in the street at 2:30 on weekends; before shooting each other up, the gunslingers perform some pretty funny comedy.

The desert can get hot this time of year, so consider an escape to the air-conditioned cool of Pioneer Bowl on Mane Street. The bowling alley was opened by Roy Rogers in 1949, and it doesn’t look much different now than it did back then. Rogers hired school kids as pinsetters until automatic pin-setting equipment was installed in the 1950s. The place still houses an amazing collection of vintage pinball machines that you can play. And, don't miss Pappy & Harriet’s Pioneertown Palace, where they serve astonishingly good Tex-Mex food (mesquite-fired meats slathered in barbecue sauce) in enormous portions. And the live music is as good as the food—everything from country to folk to rock.