VA Aquarium

Yesterday we decided to go to the VA Aquarium- another first for us. It was a nice facility, in definite need of some cosmetic improvement inside, but they were working on it. We spent several hours and probably didn't even see half of the aquarium. We didn't venture out onto the nature trail or over to the Salt Marsh Aquarium. The girls loved it, Katherine delights me in the way she wants to read the signs, and experiment with the hands on demonstrations. She is such a smart cookie! :0) They didn't have too much in the way of fish, and the jellyfish exhibit was closed. However; the shark tank was pretty nice. We happened to be there for feeding time, so we stuck around and listened to the presentation and watched the show. Disappointingly, the sharks are individually fed from overhead scaffolding, a fish is attacked to a piece of PVC pipe and lowered into the water in front if the desired shark. The portions were surprisingly small, and I must say that I was hoping for a bloody feeding frenzy- it would have been much more exciting! They have an IMAX theatre onsite. This is the second time that we have seen an IMAX show- they are really impressive! At the Exploris museum in Raleigh we watched something about the Deep Sea- I don't remember the exact title... Yesterday we saw "Dolphins and Whales." They were also offering showings on Dinosaurs and Underwater Monsters. Since we had the girls with us it wasn't hard to make up our minds on what to see! Brianna is obsessed with Shamu! She was so cute during the movie, she kept reaching out and trying to touch the animals! It was adorable, when she couldn't touch them she would take off her 3D glasses and try to figure out what was going on! She must have done it 10 times- it was hilarious. Wish we had got it on video! Again- traffic was a nightmare! There was a 8 mile backup at the tunnel on our way back to the campground! We avoided it entirely, but I'm not sure how far out of the way we had to go to do so. I'm quite impressed with my husbands internal GPS- I would probably still be sitting in the traffic jam. Elton's like" We'll take such and such to this town, and then we'll get on whatever until we get here, and then we can jump onto this highway." It's so nice that he can do that, but I found myself looking at him wondering "WHY is he telling me this? I certainly won't remember... I could care less how we get there as long as we get there!" Guess its a guy thing... I think I would really like GPS. I may have him look into it. Some of us would really benefit from it- some of us who get lost 2 miles from home! LOL!