Vancouver Aquarium & Stanley Park

On Friday David stayed home from school so that we could use up our Aquarium tickets. See, I told you that seeing starfish at the ocean was fortuitous! As it happens though, Leona had a really bad cold that wasn't going away. So it was just the five of us making the trip to Stanley Park.

The first order of business was watching the Beluga show. It was, as always, spectacular! Then we unpacked our picnic lunch and ate right by the beluga pool.


While everyone else watched the dolphin show, I looked in the tide pools. I had no idea there were so many different coloured starfish. It was pretty spectacular. Especially since I could stick my hand in the water and touch everything! SO rad.


David played with a walrus.


Then we watched the belugas for a while.

Next we went to watch the belugas from underground too. There was a volunteer down in the dolphin pit who showed us how to call the belugas over. Because dolphins need oxygen to live, they sleep with half their brain. So in other words, they will shut down one half of their brain and one eye while the other half stay awake and alert.

Anyway, when the dolphins swim around, you try to catch their attention by waving. If they're asleep, you might have to try for a while until you get the attention of the side that's awake! But once the dolphins see you, they are super friendly and will come right up to the glass.

Apart from talking to the dolphins, the highlight of our trip was probably the 4D show. It was one of the Planet Earth movies, in 3D, plus with the added features of smell and touch. Spectacular!



We stopped by the jellyfish.

And tried out our newfound dolphin knowledge on the tortoise. It seemed to work.

This bad sloth was hanging off the irrigation system. The staff were trying to lure him down with food, but he ignored them and made his way to the food hanging from the ceiling...and ate while still hanging from the water pipes.

Baby beluga.



On the way out we stopped at this tree. There are a lot of reminders of the big storm of a few years ago. This is one of the most impressive. I think our kids are old enough to attempt walking the sea wall this summer. We haven't done it in years and I'd love to see the whole of Stanley Park again.