So Long And Thanks For All the Fish

Back in March, Bentley became obsessed with tiger sharks. (He has also been obsessed with killer whales, bats, wolves, bees, and crocodiles so far. We get a lot of interesting books from the library about each of these animals!) During this time, he kept telling me that he wanted to go to the ocean so he could see a tiger shark. I couldn't manage to convince him that it would take more than just a trip to the ocean to see one, so finally I figured out that the Baltimore Aquarium had tiger sharks, and I promised to take him there. Some day. I'd had hopes of doing it during spring break, but that didn't happen. So we pushed it off until summer.

And then we looked up the ticket prices and nearly reneged on our promise. $25 for an adult and $20 per child! Whoa? But a promise is a promise. And it's not like it would get any easier to go, so we finally found a day that wasn't too busy and put it on the calendar.

I will say: it was expensive, but it was also WAY cool. I'm glad we went. We probably won't make it there again for a very long time, but I sure am glad we went!

I'm going to break one of my cardinal rules and post lots of pictures of the fish. Usually I figure no one is interested in pictures of stuff they could undoubtedly find better pictures of by simply doing a Google Images search. But in this case, I can't resist the urge to do the "We saw this! This close up!!!" kind of bragging. Forgive me. And enjoy all the cool fish!

Craig carried Ryder the. entire. time. What a man!

See the skeleton of a fin whale? Not as impressive as the blue whale at the Museum of Natural History. But not far behind, either!

We could have watched the pool full of rays for hours.

Love the tiny striped fish hiding in the spines of the sea urchin

I absolutely fell in love with that tiny yellow and purple fish. Have you ever seen such colors?

Carrying an empty carrier while Craig carried a sleeping Ryder in his arms. Poor sleep-deprived baby!

That big green strip is an eel. Eeew...

Bentley was in heaven. And look at how big those things are compared to my kids!

A sawtooth shark.

This giant sea turtle is named Calypso. The poor thing is missing a flipper, but she was still pretty impressive!

Feeding time for all the rays and the sea turtle

Scuba diver feeding lettuce to Calypso.
You kind of get a better of big this sea turtle is with him next to her like that.

Me with the dolphins!!!

As creepy as jellyfish are, I think this picture that Craig took is stunningly beautiful.

A lionfish (shouldn't this be called a zebrafish?)

It absolutely poured while we were inside. We picked a great day to go!

Leaving at the end of the day. Bentley was starving and couldn't pause from stuffing crackers into his mouth to smile. It must be tough having absolutely no body fat...

We had a great time. If you've got a hot, rainy summer day to kill and a hundred bucks burning a hole in your pocket, I cannot recommend this place enough!