Adventure Aquarium & Battleship NewJersey

A while back we found out that Jeff's uncle & family would be coming to stay with us for a few days. We decided while we were doing some sight-seeing with them, we might as well make a week of it- so Jeff took off the entire week. Come to find out, Uncle Dean & Aunt Linda weren't able to make the trip. We were sad they couldn't come, but we still had the entire week off- so we decided to do a little vacation of our own around the somewhat nearby areas.
Today we went to the Adventure Aquarium & Battleship New Jersey in Camden, New Jersey. It was the first time any of us have been, and it was a blast. First of all, the timing couldn't have been better, there were only a few people there so we were able to peruse around at our own pace without having to worry about fighting crowds or loosing children in large groups. (Caleb has a serious record of getting lost in places like that...) The Aquarium was awesome! There were so many exhibits of different fish, birds, animals, amphibians, etc. We spent about 4 hours and we moved through things fairly quickly. One of our favorite stops was at the hippo exhibit. At first they were just laying there in the water, but eventually they started moving around and put on a pretty good show running and 'dancing' around in the water. We loved the huge glass window and all the neat fish inside the exhibit. Matthew was pretty enthralled and kept trying to grab the fish through the glass. I enjoyed watching Caleb, no matter how many times that silly hippo went around the cage he would always jump a little when it got close to him.
Another area we enjoyed were all the petting stations. The boys were able to pet sharks, sting rays, jelly fish, starfish, and a whole bunch of other fish and sea creatures. I touched a few, but I'm happy to just look. I especially liked all the hand sanitizer dispensers located around these stations.
One of mine & Jeff's favorites were the neat shark exhibits. They were located at various points throughout the aquarium. I loved the huge tanks with gigantic glass windows. I think I would have been happy to just sit and watch all the fish, sharks, and turtles swimming around. In one place there is a glass tunnel that you can walk through and it's pretty neat to see the sharks swimming all around you. At this point of the day Matthew was getting a little grumpy, and who can blame him? Poor kid hadn’t had a decent nap all day and it was almost 2. The shark tunnel took his attention off his tiredness for a while.
The last exhibit was the one for the penguins and seals. The seals were neat, the penguins were hilarious! They’re so funny to watch, they have these little attitudes and really put on a show for anyone watching. The boys loved them and it was fun to be outside for a little while.
After the aquarium, we headed over to tour the Battleship New Jersey. First of all, it’s amazing to see this huge beautiful ship sitting there on the river. I don’t think you realize just how big these boats are until you get right up next to them. For this tour, we opted for the “self-guided” version complete with headsets and little info boxes. It was actually really neat. You would follow the painted lines throughout the ship, entering the numbers at each stop and listen to the recording. Jacob especially got a kick out of this as he had his own personal little headset. He took it pretty seriously and would tell us, “Okay, now we need to head over to the steep stairs and be careful as we go up the port side!” (And yes, some of those staircases were steep!) It was really a lot of fun going all throughout that amazing ship. I would highly recommend the Battleship New Jersey as a stop for anyone who might ever be in the area. I learned a lot about the history of the ship, and men who served aboard it. I do have to add that I’m very impressed by anyone who could be proficient in finding their way around the ship without needing the “You-Are-Here” signs, and pained lines directing you where to go.
For us, the whole tour took just over an hour, you could spend more or less time depending on how much time you’d like to take looking around- or how many children under the age of 5 you have with you-especially when they *really* need to use the bathroom that is only located at the very end of the tour. Even with these things, we had a great time and our kids loved it. (I also think it helped that there were hardly any people there today.)
By the end of the day the kids were pretty tired, it was a fairly long day. I wasn’t sure Caleb was going to finish the tour, he was perfectly content to camp out on the stairs on the way down from the boat. Eventually he was coaxed down with the motivation of an ice cream cone. Matthew was content to sleep in his stroller on our way back to the car. I loved seeing his soft blonde hair flying in the wind. We definitely did our job as parents today; running around with the kids all day and playing hard enough that they slept most of the way home.