First trip to Vancouver Aquarium
A couple weeks ago, I suggested to Travis that we should go visit the Aquarium because I never went before.
Plus, my Entertainment Book for 2009 was still fresh and I wanted to use my 2-for-1 coupon might as well.
We were going to drive and park in Stanley Park, but I asked about the issue about paying for parking.
I had always heard it was pretty expensive, but Vicky brought up the point that by the time we get to the entrance, it would be the peak of rush-hour.
Bussing up to Stanley Park was peaceful on the #19 from Downtown.
Less than a couple minutes, we ended up at the entrance of the Aquarium.
We literally ran out of the house, so we grabbed a couple of hotdogs for breakfast from the cashier playing on his Nintendo DS to pass his time.
The Aquarium was closing at 5PM on the day we went, and we learned that if you come during the last hour you get to pay half price. Realizing how large the aquarium is, I guess in an hour you really would enjoy half of the sites and sounds of the aquarium.
He's huuuuuuge!
Started off with the “tropical” rainforest area with giant catfish, birds, little monkeys, spiders and so many other creepy critters. Travis thought that it would be funny to tap on the glass to tick off the tarantulas… It’s pretty dark in this part of the aquarium, so I warn about blurry pictures if you don’t use flash.
Sandy and real close...
Fish fish fish and more fish!
Travis got mad that I wasn’t in front of the same tank as he was when he was looking at the Lion Fish.
Once I came by, the Lion Fish decided to hide toward the hidden top part of the tank.
Oh well.
So orange!
There are about three separate areas for different ocean life- Tropical, BC Coast, and more of the strange Jellyfish matter.
Flowing Jellyfish
Fifteen minutes were left, and that’s when I started to panic a little.
We didn’t see the sea lions, belugas and the new frog exhibit yet.
I snapped as many photos as possible, and rushed over to check out the belugas and sea lions.
I completely forgot about the fact that there were no orcas at the aquarium anymore. It’s been a long time since Travis has visited the aquarium….
The frogs were hard to find in the frog exhibit.
It looked like in the majority of the tanks that they took out the frogs and forgot to place a sign for visitors to let them know that there are no frogs….
Mexico's chicken of the sea?
The most interesting creature in the Frog exhibit was Mexico’s version of their “chicken in the sea”…
Eek.
Pick a view, any view
View from Universal Studios panorama version 1
View from Universal Studios panorama version 2
On the walkway with several escalators between the main and lower levels of Universal Studios, I took a couple minutes with my camera to quickly take a few shots of the view. Travis and I probably went up and down those escalators at least four times, running to try to catch the next “Studio” tour, “Animal Actor’s” showing, and Backdraft.
I thought about standing beside the cutouts on the concrete viewing area in between the two levels, but I didn’t want to look like a Japanese tourist grinning “Hai, cheeee-zu” while holding up peace signs at the time.
The first panoramic attempt was just a row of photos I took in a row stitched together in Photoshop and colour-corrected.
The second panorama is my first HDR panorama. I HDR processed each photo first, then had Photoshop automate the stitching.
Not bad for an off-tripod pano, eh?
