Here, fishy fishy!

After my run on Sunday morning, I was all psyched up with happy endorphins. So what better way to spend the afternoon than to meet a CSIRO colleague and go to the Monterey Aquarium together?


Petra is a statistician working at CSIRO Mathematics and Information Sciences in Adelaide, and she was visiting Marc's lab for a week as part of a Fellowship. I'd not met her before - the irony of travelling halfway around the world to meet someone from your own country, nay, your own organisation - and we were excited about the parallels in our work. And we also had a lot of fun together.


The Monterey Aquarium is one of the best in the world. Although Sean and I had visited last year, the camera battery, in the spirit of inanimate objects somehow knowing when to break down to achieve maximum upset, chose to die, which made me very sad at the many lost photo opportunites. I was DELIGHTED to have a retake this year.

Petra had been promised free admission via a colleague's mate who worked at the Aquarium, but it was a bit tricky because she knew this bloke only as "John O.". Of course, pronounced with an Australian accent, this comes out "Jonno", but after a bit of confusion we were admitted gratis.


In the spirit that a picture tells a thousand words, here are many photos.


First stop was the sea otters. Having only seen freshwater otters prior to coming to Monterey, I was surprised at how large the sea otters are. Makes sense, given the wave exposure and turbulence they endure. Great White Sharks don't like to eat them because they're all furry rather than blubbery. Apparently there has been an increase in the incidence of bite marks on otters recently. Silly sharks.

 

Here is a rockfish in the otter tank. Poor thing looks blind. You aren't allowed to take flash photos, but it happens. And fish can't blink.

The wave tunnel is always lots of fun - and noisy!

 The invertebrate tanks are always so colourful and clean. They just beg to be photographed.

Spot the flathead!

The kelp tank is amazing - especially with the leopard sharks and shoaling silveries!

And then you come to the coral reef bit, and it's so beautifully illuminated, it's like (though I cringe to say it, and I say it as a veteran of many Great Barrier Reef dives).......watching "Finding Nemo" come to life.

 If you look closely, there's Nemo (the three-stripe anemonefish) in the upper right. And Dory (the blue tang).

These moray eels were just amazing:

Pretty anem-anem-anemones!

Petra and I both had unworthy visions of crayfish meals:

This is a circular tank full of anchovies:

Another rockfish. I'm sure his mother thinks he's just beautiful.

Petra, the baby and the killer whale:

Look out, Nat, there's a whale-gonna-ram-into-you!

An amazing domed room where the upper half of the dome was full of sardines, and the lower half with philosophical musing:

More of the fun sea otters! The tank can be viewed from many levels:

There is a whole section devoted to sea horses. There are even babies in tanks that you can view through magnifying glasses. The weedy and leafy seadragons are, of course, spectacular and always make me feel a little homesick. Here's a weedy:

And of course, leafies:

I really like how this shot turned out:

And I love the way the Monterey exhibits are aesthetically beautiful as well as educational:

Speaking of educational, the last section we visited was exhibits geared to make people think about the impacts of environmental pollution and climate change. The flamingo exhibit is all about mangroves and their vulnerability:

More coral reef exhibits, this time in the context of reef vulnerability to climate change and sedimentation:

Unfortunately the Deep Sea exhibit, with the Great White Shark (that later had to be released, because it ate two others) and the Sunfish, was closed until June for renovation. I was disappointed, because one of Monterey's most spectacular exhibits is the jellyfish.  We made some half-hearted attempts to pimp our Aussie nationality for backstage access, but it wasn't happening. They did have one tank on display as a token gesture, but it wasn't the spectacular red jellies that I'd been busting to photograph. Still, jellies are cool:

We ran into some turtles:

And some African penguins:

Here's half of the Aquarium viewed from the observation area at the top. The white chimneys half way around Monterey Bay are Moss Landing. 

Hipstamatic of Petra and I atop the facility:

And this, my friends, is what sea otters look like in their natural habitat. Spot the dots amongst the kelp. They lie on their backs with their heads and back feet sticking up, and they often balance a rock on their tummies that they use to crack open shellfish to eat.

 

These are a small sample of Monterey architecture encountered on the way back to the car. My favourite is the "Green Gables Inn" (middle pic). The castle inspired one, not so much.

Finally, it would not be a visit to Monterey without the obligatory photo of Cannery Row, naughtily snapped from the car as we fanged down on our way out of town: 

Thus endeth our afternoon in Monterey. And since a picture says a thousand words, aren't you glad I took the time to upload these as opposed to reading 50,000 words? Yay for photo-blogging and colourful fish!!