Monterey Aquarium

On Saturday of last week we headed off on a 3-day trip to Los Angeles, a route that was to take us through some of the best attractions on the US West Coast. The route started in Santa Clara and headed down highway 101 before taking a right turn near Salinas to Monterey. This was to be followed by a trip down national highway 1 past Big Sur and Hearst Castle to a little town called Pismo, before reconnecting with 101 for a drive into LA. These are all the subject of future postings. Everything about this trip was stunning and warrants full disclosure, starting here with reflections on a trip to one of the world's foremost aquariums in Monterey,

The aquarium is beautifully located on the shores of the Pacific Ocean, and many of the exhibits were spell-binding, several of which are treated pictorially here. The trip to Monterey ended with a walk down Cannery Row made famous by John Steinbeck.

The Aquarium has many large tanks with brilliant displays of fish from all around the world in realistic settings and with great lighting effects. The picture below shows one such tanks which was also home to numerous small sharks and, on this occasion, a diver feeding them and many of the other species.

It also has lots of 'touching pools' where kids like Max can feel the displays and handle them. Here Max has turned over a star-fish and is examining its underside.

The Aquarium has numerous specialisms, several of which are featured in this post. One was a large display of anemones, one of which is shown below.

There was also an interesting collection of the fairly rare Californian Sea Otter shown below. Fifty years ago it appears that species was on the verge of extinction through uncontrolled killing of the animals for fur.

Many tanks were home to various types of jellyfish, two of the most beautiful portrayed here.Look at the long tentacles on the first below and the surrounding plankton.

There was a lovely display of Indian Ocean corals, but that was all.

And finally sea-horses were a great specialism housed in a large number of tanks. Easily the largest and most spectacular was the enormous dragon version shown here, camouflaged to look like sea-weed.

Finally to Cannery Row, which was almost destroyed by the collapse of the Sardine industry decades ago. Now it is very expensive and up-market.

AS