At The Aquarium

Yesterday (Wednesday, "Earth Day,") my daughter Laura and I decided to visit the Maritime Aquarium in nearby Norwalk, Connecticut. The Maritime Aquarium is devoted to protecting and teaching about our wonderful Long Island Sound. One of the wonderful things about homeschooling is that you get to act on spontaneous and delightful whims. The local advertisements for the African penguins that arrived a few weeks ago proved too much for us to resist. Here are a few photos of some of the exhibits we saw.

Up close and personal. (yikes!)

(Who needs TV? It's always "shark week" here...)

Gigantic tanks behind the aquarium

A very 'New Englandy' type quotation on the wall heading toward the Imax theater.

We saw The Wild Ocean film. It was great.

There were quite a few of these rays, stingers removed, in a hands-on exhibit. I really didn't want to, but the docent insisted that I roll up my sleeves and 'pet' the slimy creature and I didn't want to hurt his feelings so I did. They were eerily friendly in a slimy fishy sort of way.
Jellyfish

Lots and lots of jellyfish.


A gecko.
I tried to ask him about insurance, but he was a little snobby and stand-off-ish.

Here are three little videos I took with my camera. Before you play them you may want to pause my 'blog music' by scrolling down to the music sidebar on the left and hitting the pause button. (It is the one that looks like a sideways = sign.) Don't you just love the old song "Calypso?" It was written by John Denver as a tribute to his friend Jacques Cousteau and his marine research vessel by that name.

Back to the videos. The first one is the big aquarium with the sharks. I swear one was staring at me like it wanted to have me for lunch. You can hear a very nervously excited little boy in the background. He was clinging to his father for dear life and saying something about "kicking the shark's butt" should the glass wall disappear.

This is seal feeding time. It is a little hard to hear because there are lots of excited children surrounding the little area that the seals swim into when it is feeding time. At the very end of the clip you can see one seal jump on the rock near the woman and if you watch till the end of the clip you will see the seal put her 'flipper' on the woman's knee the way one of my Corgis puts her paw on my foot when she is waiting for a cookie to drop. Very cute.


This one is only a couple of seconds long but shows their cuteness.

Here is Laura headed toward the outdoor penguin exhibit.

We decided that this mug in the giftshop gets
"The Unfortunate Mug Of The Day Award."

The coastlines disappear when you put a hot beverage into it.

(Note to self: not a gift for friends on anti-depressants.)

Better.
Much better!

Have a happy day my lovelies! -CS ^..^