Adventure Aquarium

We went to NJ this weekend to visit some friends. On Monday, Bubba and I went to Adventure Aquarium in Camden, NJ. We arrived about two hours before closing which turned out to be just about perfect. It was almost as if we had a private viewing. We only ran into about 15 other people, total. We didn't have to wait in line or peep around shoulders. Bubba was able to walk around and I didn't have to worry about him taking his time or getting in anyone's way. In other words, it turned out to be a very good experience.

I lived in NJ for two years and never once went to the aquarium. Strange because I love aquariums. I used to go to the one in Boston every chance I got. Actually, I didn't even know Camden had an aquarium until our NJ visit this weekend. All this time, it was just down the road from where I lived when I was there. On another note, I drove by my old apartments (I had two while there). I can't believe I remembered how to get there, probably only because I remembered I lived off of "Exit 5." Seems like everyone in certain parts of NJ give directions based on which Turnpike exit you take...

Anyway, the aquarium has these two HUGE hippos. They were kind of hard to see since the water was so dirty but we waited around so Bubba could see them from the under water window. I didn't get a good picture of their faces but you can see how big they are...out of all the stuffed animals they had in the gift shop, Bubba wanted the hippo. I love hearing him say "Hippo" - don't little kids have the cutest way of saying things?

The aquarium has a ton of things you can touch - sharks, stingrays, jelly fish, star fish, etc. Pretty neat. They even had baby (4 months old) sting rays for the little people to touch. Bubba almost touched one but stuck with just getting his hands wet for the most part. The aquarium also had Purell dispensers all over the place to keep everyone clean.

Of course they also had "Nemo" - lots and lots of Nemos...Bubba didn't want to leave them. Since at some point we did have to leave, he finally settled for looking at the pictures. Once we got into the shark tunnel he totally forgot about Nemo. There's this cool glass tunnel where you walk under the water in their giant shark tank. The sharks are literally swimming around you - pretty cool.

The only downside to the visit was I only had my cell phone to take pictures. I didn't get any good ones in the shark tunnel because it was too dark. I got plenty of pictures but with a good camera would have gotten even better ones.