Monterey Bay Aquarium

While in Monterey, I really wanted a chance to see the Aquarium, which is said to be the best in America.

Unfortunately, it is very expensive to go in, but, through some wonderful connections, we managed to get in. We had a fantastic time. We started off with the otters at feeding time. The otters made quite a show! They had to do tricks for some of their food. They were given shelled food because if they give them whole, shell and all, they bang it against things to get it open. In this case the windows.

Next, we moved out smartly to see the last of the penguin feeding. The aquarium is huge with two floors and a bridge on the top floor. The "south African" penguins were cute, but not as exciting as the energetic otters! We looked around on the top floor at the different fish. Including Nemo and Dory (above).
They have lots of cool jellyfish as well and we got some really great pictures. You can get a really good close up look at them through these tanks. We headed downstairs to see a show about Great Whites. How they attach tracking devises and where they go. It was really interesting. We learned that the sharks don't really leave their area. Unlike whales, the furthest they go from CA, is Hawaii. The sharks don't mix with different sharks from different places.
They have touch zones, where you can feel kelp and starfish. They also have a neat area where you can touch bat rays (to the left) which are like sting rays. The stingers have been removed and they swim around in a little pool.




The Secret lives of the Sea Horses was really neat as well. There are tons of different kinds. All different colors and sizes. This was one of our favorites. They like to wrap themselves around plants in the tank, and they swim funny. With little fins on their backs going back and forth rapidly.

We saw a diver go down in a huge tank to feed the fish and sharks. He wasn't exactly a "SCUBA" diver because his tank wasn't self contained, but we did see lots of scuba divers outside the aquarium. He had a microphone so he could talk to us while in the tank.
We took a peek outside to look at Monterey Bay, it is really pretty. Altogether we had a great time and now understand why it's the #1 aquarium!

~Toley~