The Aquarium!

Okay, so back to the aquarium. Folks, if you ever have a chance to go, I highly recommend it. I had so much fun! But, as you probably gathered from Claire's blog, I recommend going on a slightly less crowded day. Oy vay.

Probably the coolest part of all was the fact that you get to touch various and sundry creatures. So here, for your viewing pleasure, are the creatures I, personally, myself, touched with my own fingers!


This, awed readers, is the shark that I touched. Well, not this one specifically, but this kind. This was my favorite moment of the day. I stroked its side as it swam by, and was pretty awestruck that I'd touched a shark. It felt sand-papery. I think I'm going into marine biology in my next life.






Next I touched a ray. That was pretty cool, but it was kind of gross because it was squishy. I'm not a big fan of squishy things. Unless they are things like marshmallows or jello. But those are squishy in a good way. Rays are squishy in a gross way. But still, I'm glad I had the experience. I mean, how many people get to touch rays? Hm, I guess a lot now. But I'm one of them!







Next on the agenda were the shrimp. I'm not a huge fan of shrimp. They are weird looking, bordering on scary looking. But of course I still wanted to touch one. I discovered that they are very dart-y. As in, they dart away when you touch them. This resulted in a sort of very high pitched "eeep!" from me when it happened. The scientific discoveries go on...










I think the last creature to be greeted by my finger-tip was the star fish. As you can imagine, it felt kind of poke-y. That was pretty cool, but I was kind of distracted at this point by Claire's sudden realization that her watch was not waterproof, but had been quite underwater while she touched the starfish. No worries though, the watch was soon off, dried, and as good as new. Phew.




And then of course there were the other fascinating creatures there, many and many a creature, that were off limits for fingers. Like the pirahnas, for instance, which are deceptively beautiful. I enjoyed the mammal population: the otters, seals, penguins, etc. But the most intriguing find of the day (as Claire mentioned on her blog, and continues to mention on a regular basis off her blog) had to be the leafy sea dragon. Incredible. I had no idea such a thing existed! I thought the tank was just full of vegetation, until one began to move about, and then another and another. WOW! Talk about great camouflage. Here are some pictures, so you can see for yourself:

























Amazing, are they not? More evidence for the incredible creative power of God! So, once again, I urge you all to add the GA Aquarium to your lists of things to do someday!