Vacation Day 10: Monterey Bay

We took the girls to the Monterey Bay Aquarium today. Two lessons learned though:

1) Always buy your tickets through AAA - not only are they cheaper, but it saves you having to stand in line for a good 45 minutes.
2) Do not try to make the drive down & back in one day. You will do nothing but become cranky and begin to strongly dislike each other by about Fairfield on the way back :) He who said, "Life is not about the destination, but the journey" never drove southbound on I-5.

We felt blessed once again that the girls are such great travelers. They chatted and colored & played with playdoh on their trays on the way down. At one point Caleigh exclaimed, "Look! A zombie! He wants to dance."

With that said, the girls had a fantastic time there. We spent a good 3 hours there & saw EVERYTHING there was to see. Particular favorites of the girls were the sea cucumbers, the sea horses & the river otters.

It was said river otters that became the most memorable and the girls would tell everyone who would listen about what they had experienced. As a "yeah, these fellows are certainly cute, but you wouldn't want to have one for a pet" warning, there was a little container in front of the exhibit that had a sample of what otters use to mark territory - a mixture of musk and, well, you know. For days afterward, the first thing the girls would say when someone asked them if they had fun at the aquarium was, "We smelled otter poop!"

After the aquarium, we had dinner at Bubba Gump's and ate while watching the seals disappear & resurface and the birds playing on the breeze. On the way home, we stopped at a little beach for a quick romp in the surf. Alessa was not too keen on the big waves.

We had a long, fun, chilly, humorous, sandy day.