Memorial Day Weekend

It was a long weekend, a 3-day weekend, but it seemed too short. Thought we could chill at home and relax, but no, activities lined up.

The highlights for the kids must be their 1st experience to the aquarium. We went to the Aquarium of the Bay at the Pier 39 in San Francisco. The weather was surpringly nice. Sunny and clear sky, just a little bit too much wind. Well, I guess it comes with the package since we're at the pier by the sea. My coworker strongly recommended the Monterey Aquarium, but due to other activities/committments, we decided to go to the one in SF instead. To me, I was a bit disappointed, but for the kids, they were thrilled.

When we entered the aquarium, before we went downstair to the "tunnels", there're several tanks of fish. Ashlyn and Alex were so excited, going from one tank to another. If I didn't urge them to proceed, we could probably spend another 30 minutes there.

As soon as we walked out the elevator, there's the first tunnel, where it similate the ocean closer to the shore. Every visitor was excited and everybody was just standing at the front end of the tunnel. Woo's and Ahh's. It took us a good 5 - 10 minutes to go through the first tunnel, not that there're much to watch, it's just stopping and waiting and trying to get the stroller to pass through.

The second tunnel similate the deeper ocean. There're sharks and rays. Needless to say, the rascals were estitic. Alex kept on tabbing the glasses, thinking he could touch the fish. Ashlyn just running up and down the tunnel and amazed by the fish all over and around her.

We finished the 2nd tunnel and started from tunnel #1 again cux Ashlyn wanted to see the fish again. She wanted to see the 3rd time, possible the 4th, or more, but I told her we would go look at something else.

So, we went back upstairs to the "Touch of the Bay" where you can touch the rays, baby sharks and star fish. Ashlyn was scare to touch, but Alex was so excited and rolled up his sleeves just like his daddy and ready for it. At the end, Alex touched the trepang/sea cucumber (海參), and yelled out "I touched it!"

Then we went to watch the seals by the pier. They smell and noisy, but the kids loved to watch them.

As we were leaving the dock, Alex was so tired and he fell asleep instantly as we put him in the stroller. Poor kid, he was so tired that he didn't even want to have his formula. As for Ashlyn, she was still too excited and hoping we were going to take her to another aquarium.