I know what you did at the aquarium
One of the perks of my new job is free tickets to the New England Aquarium, which I've been wanting to visit for a while. Little known fact: I love aquariums, and the last one I visited was in Albuquerque, which was surprisingly abundant for an aquarium in a landlocked city.
The opportunity presented itself when mattsachs and blacktabi invited us over for gaming this past Saturday. Gaming was to start at 7pm, and Matt (my Matt) was to have D&D in East Boston during the day, so I was looking for something to do in or around Boston so that we wouldn't have to drive into the city separately. The aquarium seemed like a logical choice, and natbudin agreed to accompany me, since he too was attending the evening's party.
Lo and behold, D&D was canceled on account of E. coli (I hope brazenheart is okay…), so Matt joined us after all. The three of us parked at Wellington station and took the T into the city, arriving at the harbor at around 2pm. There was a stupidly long line to buy tickets, but the passes from my work enabled us to through the express line. Sweet!
The crowds were kind of insane, but overall it was an enjoyable experience. NEAQ is definitely the best aquarium I've ever visited. The whole space is built around their "Giant Ocean Tank," a 23-foot tall tank with sharks, turtles, rays, and lots of reef fish. There is a spiral stair that you can follow up or down along the side of the tank, with plenty of different views of the tank; along the walls on different levels are the other exhibits. We spent a good portion of our time gazing on this tank - just as I thought I was getting bored of it, I would see something new. One bit of excitement was watching divers feed the sharks - the nurse sharks by hand, and the sand tiger sharks with a fish on the end of a stick.
The "other exhibits" were not also-rans; they had an impressive set of displays, including unusual sea horses, an anaconda in a South American rainforest habitat, an electric eel, a "poisonous and venomous" display, including lionfish and stonefish, a schooling fish display with mackerel (?), etc, etc. We skipped the New England tide pool display - where you could touch various tide pool inhabitants - because the lines were too long, and tended to linger at the displays of local habitats, which I guess were neglected for being less "interesting."
Oh, and let us not forget the seals. There are seven harbor seals in a habitat at the front of the building, which is viewable without entering the aquarium. At the back of the building they have a habitat for Northern fur seals. We spent a lot more time watching the former than the latter, as the fur seal exhibit was packed with people. It is one of the newest features of the aquarium, so that's probably why.
Also featured at the aquarium are 80 or so penguins - little blue penguins, African penguins, and rockhopper penguins. When we first arrived there, a large number of staff seemed to be searching the penguin area - which takes up the whole first floor. By the time we climbed up to the top of the building and back down again, they were feeding the penguins by hand. That was a fun sight to watch - 20 or so penguins mobbing one staffer, trying to throw themselves into the tray of fish he was carrying.
I didn't bring my camera, since I thought that the lighting would be too poor to take pictures, but Nat was able to get some on his snazzy iPhone 4 - including one of me with my buddy Arlong, which is what I dubbed the largest of the sand tiger sharks, who seemed to follow us as we wound our way around the giant ocean tank.
Apparently I could even sponsor my buddy, if I were so inclined.
I have to admit, I am kind of tempted to plan another trip to the Aquarium, but on a weekday, and not in the summer - sometime when the crowds aren't so bad. And probably by myself, because not everyone is a geek like me who can spend hours just reading about the exhibits. Maybe that's what I'll use one of my floating holidays for…
We spent about 2 1/2 hours exploring the aquarium, and then decided to walk along the harbor to South Station and then to Chinatown. I wanted to get a Charlie Card at South Station, so that I could stop paying $2 per fare whenever I go into the city, but I totally failed in that effort thanks to apathetic MBTA employees.
We planned to have dim sum at China Pearl in Chinatown, but this was complicated by the fact that a) China Pearl doesn't serve dim sum for dinner, and b) there was a wedding going on at the restaurant. We were going to leave, but were told that part of the restaurant was available. We sat down and thus proceeded to simultaneously be ignored and get in the way. It made me very uncomfortable, which turned into very grumpy when we had to wait twenty minutes to get our check because our server was busy helping the wedding party. On the up side, the spicy tofu I ordered was very good, and the crab rangoons were, without a doubt, the best crab rangoons I've ever eaten - the perfect balance of crab and cream cheese, and redolent of sesame oil. Too bad I left my leftovers in Matt and Liz's fridge.
After dinner, we headed to Somerville and Matt and Liz's gaming event. It was pretty subdued - most of the attendance was coworkers of Liz. I played Tales of the Arabian Nights and then crashed hard - a day of being on my feet, and the heat in the house, did me in. I spent the rest of the evening on the couch, variously reading Liz's Real Simple magazines and sleeping, while everyone else played Battlestar Galactica or Robo Rally. BSG went on for far longer than it should have, because someone (*coughcoughnatbudin) neglected to realize he was a Cylon. Imagine Shadows over Camelot if the traitor forgot they were the traitor! We finally got home at 2am, and, not surprisingly, I slept until like 11am the next day.
Sunday was less exciting - picking up my CSA, bringing Matt to the airport for his final trip to Atlanta for work, cooking, and playing Dragon Warrior Monsters 2. Ho hum.
The opportunity presented itself when mattsachs and blacktabi invited us over for gaming this past Saturday. Gaming was to start at 7pm, and Matt (my Matt) was to have D&D in East Boston during the day, so I was looking for something to do in or around Boston so that we wouldn't have to drive into the city separately. The aquarium seemed like a logical choice, and natbudin agreed to accompany me, since he too was attending the evening's party.
Lo and behold, D&D was canceled on account of E. coli (I hope brazenheart is okay…), so Matt joined us after all. The three of us parked at Wellington station and took the T into the city, arriving at the harbor at around 2pm. There was a stupidly long line to buy tickets, but the passes from my work enabled us to through the express line. Sweet!
The crowds were kind of insane, but overall it was an enjoyable experience. NEAQ is definitely the best aquarium I've ever visited. The whole space is built around their "Giant Ocean Tank," a 23-foot tall tank with sharks, turtles, rays, and lots of reef fish. There is a spiral stair that you can follow up or down along the side of the tank, with plenty of different views of the tank; along the walls on different levels are the other exhibits. We spent a good portion of our time gazing on this tank - just as I thought I was getting bored of it, I would see something new. One bit of excitement was watching divers feed the sharks - the nurse sharks by hand, and the sand tiger sharks with a fish on the end of a stick.
The "other exhibits" were not also-rans; they had an impressive set of displays, including unusual sea horses, an anaconda in a South American rainforest habitat, an electric eel, a "poisonous and venomous" display, including lionfish and stonefish, a schooling fish display with mackerel (?), etc, etc. We skipped the New England tide pool display - where you could touch various tide pool inhabitants - because the lines were too long, and tended to linger at the displays of local habitats, which I guess were neglected for being less "interesting."
Oh, and let us not forget the seals. There are seven harbor seals in a habitat at the front of the building, which is viewable without entering the aquarium. At the back of the building they have a habitat for Northern fur seals. We spent a lot more time watching the former than the latter, as the fur seal exhibit was packed with people. It is one of the newest features of the aquarium, so that's probably why.
Also featured at the aquarium are 80 or so penguins - little blue penguins, African penguins, and rockhopper penguins. When we first arrived there, a large number of staff seemed to be searching the penguin area - which takes up the whole first floor. By the time we climbed up to the top of the building and back down again, they were feeding the penguins by hand. That was a fun sight to watch - 20 or so penguins mobbing one staffer, trying to throw themselves into the tray of fish he was carrying.
I didn't bring my camera, since I thought that the lighting would be too poor to take pictures, but Nat was able to get some on his snazzy iPhone 4 - including one of me with my buddy Arlong, which is what I dubbed the largest of the sand tiger sharks, who seemed to follow us as we wound our way around the giant ocean tank.
Apparently I could even sponsor my buddy, if I were so inclined.
I have to admit, I am kind of tempted to plan another trip to the Aquarium, but on a weekday, and not in the summer - sometime when the crowds aren't so bad. And probably by myself, because not everyone is a geek like me who can spend hours just reading about the exhibits. Maybe that's what I'll use one of my floating holidays for…
We spent about 2 1/2 hours exploring the aquarium, and then decided to walk along the harbor to South Station and then to Chinatown. I wanted to get a Charlie Card at South Station, so that I could stop paying $2 per fare whenever I go into the city, but I totally failed in that effort thanks to apathetic MBTA employees.
We planned to have dim sum at China Pearl in Chinatown, but this was complicated by the fact that a) China Pearl doesn't serve dim sum for dinner, and b) there was a wedding going on at the restaurant. We were going to leave, but were told that part of the restaurant was available. We sat down and thus proceeded to simultaneously be ignored and get in the way. It made me very uncomfortable, which turned into very grumpy when we had to wait twenty minutes to get our check because our server was busy helping the wedding party. On the up side, the spicy tofu I ordered was very good, and the crab rangoons were, without a doubt, the best crab rangoons I've ever eaten - the perfect balance of crab and cream cheese, and redolent of sesame oil. Too bad I left my leftovers in Matt and Liz's fridge.
After dinner, we headed to Somerville and Matt and Liz's gaming event. It was pretty subdued - most of the attendance was coworkers of Liz. I played Tales of the Arabian Nights and then crashed hard - a day of being on my feet, and the heat in the house, did me in. I spent the rest of the evening on the couch, variously reading Liz's Real Simple magazines and sleeping, while everyone else played Battlestar Galactica or Robo Rally. BSG went on for far longer than it should have, because someone (*coughcoughnatbudin) neglected to realize he was a Cylon. Imagine Shadows over Camelot if the traitor forgot they were the traitor! We finally got home at 2am, and, not surprisingly, I slept until like 11am the next day.
Sunday was less exciting - picking up my CSA, bringing Matt to the airport for his final trip to Atlanta for work, cooking, and playing Dragon Warrior Monsters 2. Ho hum.