New Jersey's Adventure Aquarium

I feel like I need to reintroduce myself again. We are still alive here in Philadelphia, just busy. We have been doing some very fun stuff lately, but getting everything posted on the blog has been a problem. As I am typing this, Natalie is running circles around the basement, singing portions of Disney songs, and playing with her dolls. Oh wait, she just broke her routine to come over to the desk to sing along to music playing on the computer and to ask me what the object she was playing with was. Somehow she got the lens cover to our digital camera. I have no clue how she got this, or where she got it from, but she did....she is 2, what do you expect?! So, as you can see, we have our hands full right now, so I apologize for not blogging. Any of you regular blog readers are welcome to visit and have Natalie entertain you while I write a blog entry. :)

Okay, let me recreate the highlights from the last month of Natalie's life...it may take a few days to catch up, so please come back.

About a month ago, I took Natalie down to the Aquarium in Camden, NJ. Camden is right across the Delaware River from downtown Philadelphia. Kristin stayed at home to get some work done in the house, so this was a dad/Natalie event, and I was excited to spend some special time with her since I think I was traveling the week before. Before we left the house, I pulled up the aquarium on the internet to buy tickets (www.adventureaquarium.com), but realized that they wanted $2-3 per ticket for a "handling fee." The only "handling" that was going to be done was me taking the tickets off my printer, and I wasn't going to give them the extra money. I decided I would just buy tickets when we got there and "save" the money. More on this later...

As I was driving down there, which would normally be a 1 hour drive, I hit bad traffic as they had the entire interstate down to 1 lane. I quickly changed my route, but it still look me 2 hours to get there. During my "extra" time in the car, I started thinking about how expensive the food in the aquarium was probably going to be. It was at this moment, stuck in traffic, that I came up with the "brilliant" idea of eating lunch in Camden before going to the aquarium. Food is food, right? I didn't realize this, but Camden isn't exactly Smalltown, USA or Safetown, USA. It is more like, WishIWasPackingHeat, USA or IHopeTheColorsIAmWearingAreSafe, USA. So, we quickly ate our lunch at McDonalds...and got back in the car. Maybe I am being a little dramatic, but hey, its genetic.

We finally make it to the aquarium, pay for parking, and walk towards the entrance. I realize there must be something else going on here, because there was a really REALLY long line and it wasn't moving. Turns out that the aquarium is the only thing in Camden that people would line up for, and this line is the one for tickets. If you already HAD tickets, you could walk right in. So much for saving a few dollars! I spent the next hour in line trying to keep Natalie entertained without losing our spot in line. Amazingly, she was so well behaved, I didn't have to chase after her once. Here is a picture of her as we get towards the front:



We get our tickets and start heading for the entrance. We stopped to take a few pictures while watching boats on the Delaware river. That is Philadelphia on the other side of the water.



Here is a picture of the Ben Franklin bridge:





We go inside, and the first exhibit is dedicated to coastal fish. They have a large, yet shallow, tank that filled with tons of pan shaped fish. Here is a few pictures we took in front of the tank:





The next thing that Natalie really enjoyed was the hippo. They have a few hippos and we got to see them swim right by us. These animals are huge! If you have ever watched Dirty Jobs on the Discovery Channel, there is one episode where Mike Rowe has to clean this very tank. Definately a "dirty job", because there was lot of "dirty" water.







I did take a few pictures of various other fishtanks, but they didn't really turn out. Too much flash, and not a steady enough hand to take pictures without a flash. I am sure if you check out the website linked above you can see more. They have plenty of sharks to look at.

Natalie really enjoyed looking at the jellyfish. Even when she sees this picture now, she says "NEMO! NEMO! NEMO!" I think Disney knows what they are doing!!