My friend Sue is leaving on Friday and hadn’t been to the aquarium yet, so I proposed that we squeeze in a visit this week. Thankfully, she found some time to do so! I really enjoyed the aquarium last year and looked forward to seeing how it had, or hadn’t, changed this year.
We met at the embarcadero on this side around 9:30 and grabbed a pulmonía since we would have had to walk fully halfway to grab a bus.
The admission price had gone up from $100 to $115. I thought $100 last year was decent value so I assured Sue that as long as we got in at least one show, we’d get our money’s worth.
The biggest changes I noticed were the addition of sharks and the deletion of most of the tortoises as well as the ostrich. There were also extra shows. We were able to take in all four, and they were in rapid succession! The aquarium was packed and you could only attend a show if you had the right coloured ticket.
We did a tour inside before the first show. The big skeleton was labeled this year and as it turns out, it’s a grey whale.
I liked how all the bones were labeled to show the similarities with humans.
I liked the detail of this pelican skeleton with a fish in its beak.
Iguana with a long tail.
Sharks.
Lion fish.
I was hungry and these guys looked delicious.
Seahorses.
This guy looked a little deformed…
We went outside after so Sue could get a sense of the gardens and zoo pens. Crocodiles:
Deer.
We headed back inside for the first show, called “buceo,” which means dive. It was a quick thing of a guy going into the “shark tank” and swimming with the fish. He got hold of the shark and took it around for everyone to get a good look. He was quite entertaining and I learned a few things about sharks that I have, of course, forgotten already. 🙂 The audio was echoey and difficult to understand so I’m glad there was lots of visual entertainment!
We then went back out and passed these beautiful black swans. Hmm. I don’t think they were there last year!
Sue’s highlight of the day was the tiger. We did a special trip back to his pen before heading home.
I then showed Sue how to get into the two aviaries where you can walk around.
We were impressed by what the animals were fed. Lots of fresh stuff.
Imposing pelican.
Ducks. I suddenly remembered that I got bitten by a duck when I was in Scotland. I do not recommend the experience. It didn’t break the skin, but I did get a big bruise!
Magnificent peacock. They are starting to grow on me.
Very chatty parrots.
I think this was a prairie dog, or relative thereof.
The next show was about predators. We saw snakes, lizards, and a variety of birds. I wanted to volunteer to go hold a boa, but I was way too far up in the crowd to be a viable candidate. 🙁 This one was a lot of fun even if I couldn’t understand a lot of the information presented.
I liked the owl. The Spanish word sounds like their call, bújo.
A sign that I spotted before going into the parrot show. “If at night you cry for the sun, you will never see the stars.”
Sue helpfully volunteered me at the parrot show. Here I am doing the chicken dance.
And attempting to dance La Macarena (that takes me WAY back!).
But I was rewarded with getting two hold TWO parrots! Blue guy on my shoulder, red guy on my head (sharp talons, both of them!). I had a red macaw when I was a kid. This was a cute show, with the parrots doing a few tricks.
Next stop was the sea lion show, for which I didn’t get any pictures for some reason. While entertaining, it was nowhere near as long or as good as last year’s show, probably because they had to pack in more viewings. I would have been disappointed if that was all we got to see today, but when you add this show to the other three, we really got a lot of value for our tickets!
Sue went to see the tigers one last time and I spent some time with the snakes, iguanas, and and frogs. I’ll spare you the pictures. 🙂
Except of one of the meals… Again, I was really impressed by how well fed the animals are. I do have an issue with the idea of zoos, but they are a valuable tool for education. I think the Maz aquarium does a satisfactory job of taking care of its critters, with clean cages, toys, human interaction, and a good diet.
We headed out around 1:00 and went up to Avenida del Mar for a sushi lunch! Sue doesn’t do raw fish, but was very open to cooked Mexican-style rolls. We split chicken teriyaki, a Miami roll (crab, cream cheese, mango), and a California roll (shrimp, cream cheese, cucumber). The server assumed we’d want the larger versions of the rolls, so there was a mountain of food! Since it’s a cool day and we were coming home straight away, I took the leftovers. I was pleased that Sue really enjoyed her meal since I’m always nervous about taking someone to eat sushi, even when I have no intention of passing the “real” stuff off to them. Even with the error of our rolls being super sized, we only paid $175 each, and that was with a very generous tip. I much prefer eating this stuff with another person since we can get more variety.
It was a great day out with a good friend. Thanks for coming along, Sue!
