Bloomington's cultural life orbits Indiana University, and the IU campus is the first place to explore. The I.M. Pei-designed Art Museum and the Lilly Library of rare books are the intellectual anchors; the Sample Gates at the end of Kirkwood Avenue mark the main campus entrance. The campus architecture — limestone buildings among old hardwood trees — is among the most attractive in the Midwest.
Off campus, the Monroe County Courthouse and surrounding square form the centre of downtown. The WonderLab science museum on Sixth Street caters to families. For outdoors, Lake Monroe to the south is Indiana's largest reservoir with good swimming, boating, and hiking trails. The Hoosier National Forest, which presses in from the south and west, has excellent mountain biking.
The Kinsey Institute at IU is worth a visit for its Beebe Gallery, which houses art and artefacts related to human sexuality — serious, thought-provoking, and unlike anything else in Indiana. And the abandoned Empire Quarry on the city's edge provided the limestone for the Empire State Building before its closure.