Generally when I’m on the road I like to visit places that are exclusive to the area. That’s why I was planning on visiting the George W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum on Saturday. But that, and most of the other museums in Dallas, were closed due to the ice storm. I ended up at the aquarium because it was the only show in town. But even so, it was a pretty cool place to visit.
I had to enter through a side door because the tropical plants at the main entrance were covered with plastic to protect them from the cold.
Reviews on the Internet said that the aisles in this place were narrow — which they were — and that it was always so crowded that it was hard to move — which it wasn’t. I don’t think I saw more that 15 other visitors during the three hours I was there.
There are multiple levels, so some of the exhibits were visible from eye level and above and sometimes even from below.
There were a lot of birds, including many that were free-flying, and mammals and reptiles and amphibians along with the fish. It was really more of an indoor zoo than a typical aquarium.
They had a three-toed sloth that was free to crawl around in some small trees in the middle of the path without bars or netting. There was a young guy standing there to make sure nobody touched it or messed with it. When I first went past, the sloth was climbing up and down. The guy said nothing as I held the chair out for inspection. Later, it was sleeping curled up on a branch, but the guy was still dutifully watching.
The spotted jaguar was relaxing by the glass of its enclosure when I put the chair on the ledge. It took a swipe at it from a sitting position, then stood and made a more serious attempt. Then it slowly ambled away as though it had only been kidding and wasn’t really interested.
Later this cat had disappeared and a black one had taken its place. But that one was only interested in chewing on a piece of black piping and paid no attention to me or the chair.
Here’s the shark tank from above, with two people in the glass tunnel.
And a shot from inside.
The family in the photo above was speaking a language I didn’t recognize. They saw the chair when I pulled it out and laughed. A minute later, there was the sound of a conch shell being blown and a man and woman walked through in costumes and invited us to their show.
We followed them through the museum for a ways until they disappeared through a doorway. We could hear their show but didn’t see it until I finally found them on top of the jaguar cage.
After their dances, they explained about Mayan culture, then came down for photos.
I volunteered to take a photo of the family with the Mayans. The father asked me about the chair and seemed interested but unable to understand why I did it. He asked me if he could take a photo of the chair and I said sure — if I could take a photo of them with it. Their older daughter was playing gently with it, but she put it down just before I got the photo.
We got to talking. It turns out that he and his wife are from Moldova and immigrated five years ago — to Illinois. They were in Dallas on vacation and at the aquarium for the same reason I was — it was the only thing in town that was open. We laughed at the lack of snowplows and how the only people out on this day were from the north.
These Black-footed Penguins were outside, but even they seemed cold. Perhaps they’d acclimatized to typical Dallas weather. The high was about 20 degrees on this day.
A large tank contained creatures native to the Orinoco River, including a manatee. It was drifting about trying to extract food from a plastic pipe. While I was taking photos, a Dallas policeman walked through and said that on normal days, the crowd would be so thick I wouldn’t be able to see the manatee, much less take photos.
There was more — snakes and bats and owls and crocodiles and otters and all sorts of stuff. For a fall-back activity, it was a lot of fun. I’m glad I got to go — on a day when it was empty.