Living Planet Aquarium

Just before Christmas, I found a google offer of season passes to the Living Planet Aquarium for $10 each.  Given that it would cost us $18 to go one time anyway, I hopped on the deal and bought one for Emersen and myself, since Bentley is free.  I figured it would be a great outing for really cold or hot days for the next year.  We never made an opportunity to go, however, until just this week.  And, man, it was worth the $20!  We were only there for just under 2 hours, so I would have HATED to pay $18 for that.  Besides the money, Emersen LOVED it and didn't want to leave.  She keeps talking about going again.

I was in a good mood too, so I let her do whatever and go wherever she wanted.  Bentley was in the stroller most of the time because they like to run different directions and he was getting tired.  She would run from tank to tank, yelling, "Look, mom!" and then talk about how "cute" the fish were and how fast they were swimming.  It was a little dark, but I tried to take some pictures anyway.

She didn't want to get too close to the critters that stuck to the glass walls, like this octopus and starfish.  They were too scary for her.

She looked at the many different seahorses for a long time.  Even I thought they were pretty cute.

 The lion fish was one of her favorites.

Do I look like I'm having fun? 

We also spent a lot of time at the stingray station.  At first, she was a little wary of touching them, especially when one suddenly came up out of the water right in front of her.  After watching the little girl next to her touch the stingrays over and over, she gained more confidence and kept her hand in the water.  She would say, "Come here, fishies," and when they would swim past, she would say, "Almost."  She kept trying to touch them and finally did.  She was pretty excited about it, "I did it!  I touched it!"  I think that was the only time she did though even though she was trying for a while.

The otters and penguins were fun to watch, but they were moving so fast I couldn't get very good pictures of them.  I didn't take any pictures of the otters because there was a crowd, but she loved watching them.

Measuring up. 

I think Bentley just liked climbing onto the rocks to see into the tanks more than anything.  I thought he was going to fall so many times.

Not too surprisingly, the education room was another favorite place.  It had computer games to play!  

We'll definitely have to go again soon.  Maybe I'll let Bentley run around more next time.  According to Daniel, they are going to build a new aquarium that isn't an old grocery store.  That should be nicer.