I’ve been to any number of public aquariums in my time from the “Blue
Planet” in North Wales and the rather special basement of the California Academy
of Sciences, to a rather intimate little place on Anglesey, but my favourite, by
far, is the Monterey Bay Aquarium, possibly because it was the very first
“proper” one I ever went to.
It was suggested as a possible place to visit by the mother of a friend
of mine, the much-missed Nancy, when we travelled together for a while back in
’96. To be honest, at first, I wasn’t all that convinced because, first of all,
I’d never really heard of it and I had lots of other parts of America which I
was keen to explore as that was my first ever trip there, and it also felt a
little like I would be spending rather too long indoors. I also wasn’t all that
interested in “wildlife” back then, either, but I went along with the
suggestion anyway. After all, it wasn’t just my “holiday” was it...? And Nancy and
her husband had been terribly welcoming to this young stranger arriving upon
their doorstep and had looked after me rather well, so it would have been
churlish to refuse that one request to alter my itinerary, such as it was.
The visit was primarily to see the advertised big new viewing window
which was due to open that year but, unfortunately, we had arrived weeks too
early for that which was a bit of a shame, but even so, I was rather “blown
away” by the place anyway and I can honestly say that the seeds that were sown
on that day led to me becoming far, far more interested in the impressive
antics and sights of the natural world in later years, so I will always be
grateful for that, and, if I am in the area, it’s always top of my list of
things to go and see.
I didn’t get many pictures on that first visit, just the very blurry front half of some kind of a shark and a shimmering blur of the anchovies that swim in a huge cylindrical display tank that sits in the middle of a hallway, but it was enough to remind me of a happy day well spent.
This year, however, we came armed with all of our latest camera equipment having joined the digital age during the more than half a decade since our last visit and, whilst I’m still far too impatient to be bothered with all that “settings” nonsense and consequently still get far more pictures of blurs set on a blue background, between us we got a few rather good shots, even though I had to spend far, far too much time next to the largest picture window failing utterly to get my much-desired “good” picture of a shark and somehow managed to fail to successfully record the rather cuddly sea otters at play as well.
But the Monterey Bay Aquarium remains a hugely inspiring place to spend half a day or more even if you’re not particularly taken with looking at sea life. The many viewing windows are vast and impressive, as are the huge display tanks, and, as an opportunity to see some of the natural wonders of our planet that you would otherwise never get to see, or just to watch someone in a wetsuit feeding some fish, it really can’t be beaten. The work that they do in promoting the problems of the sea life of the bay and wider ocean and in helping to conserve it is all rather wonderful too, and, all-in-all, despite the fact that you might want to dismiss them as being a “zoo”, I think that you’d have to list them as being amongst the “good guys” of life.
As an aside,
the Monterey Bay Aquarium also doubled as the “Cetacean Institute” in 1986’s
“Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home” which is possibly why the railings in the
outside areas which overlook the bay always seem so very familiar to me, but that, crucially, really is not the reason that I first allowed myself to be persuaded to go there, honest...!
Anyway, if you are at all interested (and why wouldn’t you be...?), here’s a link to their live webcams which I hope that you’ll enjoy. Don’t forget that they are eight hours behind UK time, so it might still be the middle of the night over there when the sun is shining over here (some hope!), but there are definitely live fish feeds about 10.30 in the morning and 2.30 in the afternoon local time, which are always a lot of fun.
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