Monterey Bay Aquarium

Squishing into a giant clam in the splash zone.

This past Thursday we headed down to Monterey for a birthday vacation. The Monterey area is one of our favorite places to go. While we were there we went to the aquarium. We were hoping to see the 4th great white at the aquarium, but it was released a few days before we got there. We were a little disappointed because we had seen the previous 3 great whites they had. They are just young little sharks, but still impressive to see up close.

We did enjoy seeing many of the other exhibits. We saw the jellyfish exhibit for the last time because it will be leaving the aquarium in January, but in the spring of 2009 a new seahorse exhibit will be opening in its place. We also got to see the newly remodeled splash zone (for the kids), but it didn't seem that different to us.Each time we go it is hard to pick a favorite animal or exhibit because they are all pretty cool. I think my favorite is still the sea otters. The mola mola (ocean sun fish) was a pretty close 2nd. If you haven't seen the mola mola before it is a very ugly and unusual fish, but that is why I like it so much. Rich's usual favorite, the giant octopus, was not active this time, so he picked a different favorite. His favorite exhibit this time was the outer bay. Rich liked to watch the school of anchovies moving together to look one big fish.