A Day in Monterey Bay

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Last weekend we finally got to celebrate our birthdays - mommy's and daddy's, which had crept past us in May and we didn't really notice. Or a better way to say it - we've been enjoying the little things in life so much that we didn't think of looking elsewhere for fun.

Nevertheless, Mara is now older and more aware of everything. She is pointing and naming and matching items. Her world is expanding at a higher rate, so it was a good time to take a trip to Monterey Bay to see the ocean and the awesome aquarium. We've been wanting to visit their new jellyfish exhibit SO much since it reopened last year!

Here's the sum-up in a video, and more details and photos below:




We first started by spotting a cool pumpkin at the lunch restaurant. Mara was wearing her sea animals pajama pants, because admit it: what is more important, whether you are wearing pajamas outdoors, or whether you are matching the fishy atmosphere? To us it was obviously the latter.


 In the aquarium, Mara got to see the sardines swarming about intensely. We had an antsy Daddy, he really, really, really wanted to see that jellyfish exhibit, so we moved on pretty quickly.

Jellyfish!!

We touched a few algae, but the decorator crab was scary so we just watched him for a bit.

We went to the large fish tank - they had a giant flat sunfish, sharks and humongous tuna fish!

We also went outside and watched the wave splash. Mara scrunched her nose at it when she got sprayed in the face, so she stayed for another wave.

And of course more jellyfish!

This fish was probably convinced he's hiding very well behind the post. 


After the aquarium - and Mara's second nap - we stopped at the ocean! This was such a peaceful time. We slowly walked on a trail while Mara was walking about, moving sand and little stones from one place to another. We didn't go near the ocean because of all the beached seaweed that was attracting swarms of flies, and there were rocky deathtraps all about. Missing the nice sandy Florida beaches for sure..





Here are some photos of the three of us in the sunset, which our friend Nick was kind enough to take with his phone - both of ours were completely dead by this time.



P.S.: The ride back was very interesting. Mara usually gets very antsy if it is dark outside and she needs to go to bed - she wants to be home for the night time routine, her bed, and her bunny. This time though, we talked about all the cool lights we were driving by, we sang softly, and near the end Mara grabbed Elena's hand and just held tight to her finger. We were so impressed with how well she behaved!

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