Spring Break "Trip," Part 2: Lunch and Aquarium

After our not-so-brief IKEA visit, Travis and I went to our friend DeAndre's house for lunch. I didn't take any pictures during lunch (how awkward would that be?), so here is a picture of DeAndre:

(Photo courtesy of Kelsey Johnson and St. Luke's UMC, Bryan)

I put a picture of him singing because he's the Pastor of Music and Worship at a church in Houston. See? Appropriate.

He used to serve in the same capacity at our church in Bryan, but his family moved to Houston a little over a year ago. We miss them a lot, so we were glad of the opportunity to catch up with Dre and see his kids!

After lunch, we were headed to downtown Houston to the aquarium. This trip was made extra-exciting by the fact that I'd found a coupon on the Houston Visitors Site the night before: Buy One All-Day Pass, Get One Free! Thanks to that, we ended up getting in AND getting to do extra stuff for cheaper than if we'd both just bought normal admission. Bam.

(The coupon doesn't expire til April 15, so go get one now if you've been wanting to visit the aquarium! They also have other local discounts on the site.)

Be forewarned: If you go to the aquarium and there is a long line, it is probably the line to get in, not the line for tickets. Please go buy tickets first so you don't have to stand in line twice, like...some people we know.

It was a little small for the price of admission, but they did have some neat stuff.

There were colored lights going through a rotation, so the jellyfish would glow different colors. 

Seems risky to me.

Coral reef! 

I found Nemo.

Starfish.

Creepy much?

I had a toy that looked EXACTLY like this poison dart frog when I was little.

In hindsight, probably not a good plan.

Polka-dotted stingray! We touched a stingray, but it wasn't this one.

This just cracked me up. 

The picture on the left is what the lizard should look like. 

The picture on the right is what we saw.

Lionfish are crazy-looking.

This didn't really work, but it was supposed to be Travis in front of a bunch of giant fish.

I still put it up, because he is cute. :)

Also, there were tigers? Apparently they are the most aquatic large cat.

(Somewhat of a stretch in order to have white tigers, but it was cool to see them so close.)

Of course, the thing we had been waiting for was the Shark Voyage. The administration sneakily separated the sharks from the normal aquarium so that you have to pay extra to see them. Of course, thanks to our handy-dandy wristbands, we didn't have to pay extra.

I got really nervous because one of the little trains broke while we were waiting, but luckily they had two! So we just had to wait a little longer.

Excited about the sharks.

Our ride.

Shark Voyage consists of a train ride on a track around the outside of the aquarium, and it's narrated with facts about the aquarium and about sharks. The train drives into this tunnel and all of a sudden, the train stops and you're surrounded by sharks in a 200,000 gallon tank! Pretty cool.

I didn't take any pictures in the actual shark tunnel because I was busy being afraid that the glass was going to break and sharks were going to rain down on me. However, I was comforted by thinking that they'd be busy trying not to die, and probably wouldn't be concentrating on biting me.

All in all, the aquarium was not my absolute favorite mini-vacation we've ever done, but it was a neat experience and would be awesome if you have kids. :) It was a fun day overall!