weekend fun with the sylvesters

Today we are going to the Mystic Aquarium in Mystic, CT.  We have the Sylvesters with us because they are here visiting for the weekend.  We are so excited they are here!  It's going to be a really nice day out so we ate a big breakfast, packed into the pathfinder and got on our way.  We got there around noon.  It was packed.  Almost every parking space was taken.  I guess everyone had the same idea as us.  Look who we ran into at the entrance.

We started by visiting the Titanic exhibit they had set up.  It was devoted to educating everyone about the ship and it's wreckage.   I learned an interesting fact about the ship I didn't know.  It was never "Christened."  Meaning a bottle of champagne was never broken over the hull of the ship.  And, it's bad luck.  It's really impressive how large the ship was for the time and sad how all of those people died. We couldn't pass up this amazing photo opportunity.

 We wondered over to the sting ray touch pool.  I thought Ali would be excited to touch some sting rays but she was not very interested, so we didn't hang around for long.  After all, the main exhibit was next on our agenda.

There was so much to see here.  Starting with these two tanks.  They had artwork from a local artist inside.  He made the glass structures inside these tanks.  

I was impressed with their jelly fish exhibit.  They had quite a few different kinds.

The giant squid in this tank was most impressive.

Bennett was having fun running around.

Seahorses are so neat!

Anableps sees well both above and below the water because, over time, its ancestors evolved eyes with a two-fold function. 

We decided to check out the sea lion show next.  We watched Coco, Surfer and Safari swim, jump out of the water, dance on their flippers, stand up on their flippers and teach us the difference between seals and sea lions.  

Safari was jumping for that rope hanging from the ceiling but all I caught was her splash.

After enjoying the show we headed outside to grab a snack and check out the outdoor exhibits.  We found a bench to enjoy our snack and let Bennett wonder a little.  So, of course he finds an outlet! What are the chances?  He headed straight for the thing.  Thankfully it was covered.  

The remainder of the time we spent outside checking out the beluga whales, the penguins and the seals.  We were thankful to have such great weather. 

It was a wonderful trip but we were ready to get home after a few hours.  We all enjoyed nice naps on the way home thanks to Nick.  I hope to come back here soon and visit some of the shops.  There were a lot of them in the area.