Sunday at Cabrillo Marine Aquarium (with the Chileans)



Our friends Walter and Laura are both recipients of the prestigious Fullbright Fellowship. As such they are constantly invited to special outings and parties at rich peoples houses. This past Sunday was a Fullbright outing to the Cabrillo Marine Aquarium, they asked us along with them... and so we went.


It was a full day adventure, first we drove to the aquarium in San Pedro and had a tour of the facility by the director, Mike. The aquarium, though housed by a Frank Gehry creation, is pretty grass-roots. They specialize in the Southern California habitat and local wildlife. It's fairly no-frills, they do not charge an entrance fee, and it's neither heated nor air conditioned, but it was a really neat place to explore. One of the few tourist attractions that Hollywood hasn't gotten to. Not that that's necessarily a good thing. It's just much more "fish hatchery" than "Disney".

Matthew with the baby fish he helped to hatch (by swirling the water around to simulate a wave)

Guilty Bronson "Can I touch this?"

Next we had lunch on the beach and went to the nearby tide pools for some hands on exploration. Bronson touched his first sea anenome and held his first crab.

Then we drove up to the coast to Rancho Palos Verdes, a shore based whale study facility and visitors center. The grey whale census is taken here and they'd seen 4 whales that day. Total we saw: Zero. With a Zed. But they did have some neat exhibits and nice lawn to get our energy out on, take a look.

Mommy's tired!

Next we got lost, and eventually found our way to the Caplan's (the day's hosts) house for a wonderful mexican fiesta. Well, an enchilada dinner. It was neat to meet so many other people from various lands studying in southern California. I was especially interested in Mrs. Caplan's small garden which included 2 artichoke plants, brussel sprouts plants, strawberries, an avocado tree, a guava tree and a lumquat tree, among various usual garden variety. Bronson enjoyed pretending to water her garden with her watering can, and petting their cement cat sculpture.

It was much fun, thank you (Gracias!) Laura and Walter for letting us tag along.