San Francisco: The Academy of Sciences

[twobluestripes]

Earlier in November my mother, brother, and I joined my aunt in San Francisco to see the New Academy of Sciences. I used to love going there (the old one) when I was little, so I was naturally very excited to see how it's been completely rebuilt!

We got there well before opening at 11am, and we got in the LONGEST LINE I'D EVER SEEN (and I go to DL!). I swear, it was hundreds of people long, and multiple times longer than say, the line outside the Disneyana store before a new merch release, or the line to be in the concert audiences during the Christmas Special filming. I'm talking LONG.

We did not expect the place to be that packed. We had DLR status wait times for some features (the rainforest sphere area, which we was the only thing we did not get to see), and it took all of my crowd navigation skills to handle the day. That said, it was still very enjoyable, and I would currently recommend it to anyone who can handle a busy day at DL. Plan to spend the whole day there! For those that don't like crowds or get claustraphobic, I'd say to wait a few more months, when it's not so new and hopefully less crowded.

We started off in the basement floor, which is the aquarium. I love looking at pretty fish, so this comprised a lot of my picture-taking! For my TR, I will start with the fishies for my first segment:

Here's some familiar faces! I found Gil (with my bro Jesse), Marlon and Nemo, and Dory!




There was a GIANT tank full of fish; complete will a real life scuba diver, cleaning the glass.



A blue starfish!


Some pink spikey thingy:


The big spotty eel smiles for my camera! Look at that grin!


Pretty little things, starfish, eh?


The perfect fish face:


BEAUTIFUL colors!


Not alive. The amount of seahorses killed for homeopathic remedies, especially in Asia, is very sad. Please don't support the killing of ocean animals for tourists by buying dried starfish or seahorses!


The lionfish. SO COOL!


A really, really, really large anemone. Like, big enough to give it a hug.


Cute, lumpy little tree frogs!


Apparently, this was all found in the stomach of a shark!


A very lacey little fish


These guys are long and skinny to disguse themselves as leaves or reeds. Kind of like the stick bugs of the sea!



Jesse (to the left) watches the jelly tank.



A giant nautilus! I've never seen one before, just their shells. A mathmetician's favorite sea creature.


Very large and rotund fishies:


A pretty little tank with a pretty little fish


Some big orange lizards


Some really BIG fish things.




A very colorful tank w/ anemones and starfish


The interactive tidepool, with my brother touching a starfish. (I touched an urchin)


Very transparent moon jellies. Bet this guy with his fancy camera would have much better pictures than I do!


Sand dollars! They are purple and kind of fuzzy, and they stand themselves up and scoot around. Very different than the dead white shells you find on the beach.



A VERY LARGE FISH:


That's it for the aquarium, the rest to be continued...

[ralfrick]

I know it just re-opened, but the wait sounds insane. Was it a weekend? The once a month free day? We used to go to there or the zoo on those free days, and usually saw as many strollers at the zoo as there were cars on the freeway getting there. I want to see how it looks, but may wait a bit for things to settle down. Guessing the shark in question was a tiger; they've found some weird stuff in those. I've seen some sharks while diving, but a tiger sighting would definitely worry me.

A bientot.

[twobluestripes]

Originally Posted by ralfrick

I know it just re-opened, but the wait sounds insane. Was it a weekend? The once a month free day? We used to go to there or the zoo on those free days, and usually saw as many strollers at the zoo as there were cars on the freeway getting there. I want to see how it looks, but may wait a bit for things to settle down. Guessing the shark in question was a tiger; they've found some weird stuff in those. I've seen some sharks while diving, but a tiger sighting would definitely worry me.

A bientot.

Well, it was the Sunday before Veteran's Day. So I'm sure that didn't help the crowd. My aunt recently went to New York, and she said all the busy museums there stagger the arrival times when you buy your ticket ahead of time so that everyone doesn't show up at once, but that was definitely not the case here.

[PretzelSouls]

It looks like you had a lot of fun, I'll have to get out there someday. Can't wait for the rest of the trip report.

[haunted_hottie]

Love the pics of the aquarium! The Academy of Science is one of my favorite places to go along with the deYoung Muesum and the Japanese Tea Garden. I'm lucky enough to be only 3o minutes from SF... gads I love my city!

[OogieBoogie]

Originally Posted by haunted_hottie

Love the pics of the aquarium! The Academy of Science is one of my favorite places to go along with the deYoung Muesum and the Japanese Tea Garden. I'm lucky enough to be only 3o minutes from SF... gads I love my city!

WHOOTT!!!!! Another Local!!!!

[PinBrian]

Thank you for the pics! I have been dying to get there to check out the new re-model, but have been holding off due to the insane crowds I have heard about.

The old Academy holds a special place for me (as I am sure it does a lot of SF Bay locals). I have very fond memories of the old gator lagoon, the old round-a-bout (which I was very very lucky to see a Great White in when I was 5) and especially the old Poison Dart Frog displays, which helped me get hooked on them, and eventually start to keep them!

Thank you again, and looking forward to seeing more!

[haunted_hottie]

Originally Posted by OogieBoogie

WHOOTT!!!!! Another Local!!!!

Locals rock.

[ralfrick]

Anyone else remember the 2 headed snake they had years ago?

A bientot.

[PinBrian]

Originally Posted by ralfrick

Anyone else remember the 2 headed snake they had years ago?

A bientot.

Yup! That freaked me out.

Anybody else lucky (or old enough) to have seen the Great White they had in the round-a-bout for a week or so in the early 80's?

[Light Mouse]

*makes a note to visit to Academy of Sciences when he visits home*

I grew up in Fremont! Does that count for anything?

[IzzyInWonderland]

A giant nautilus! I've never seen one before, just their shells. A mathmetician's favorite sea creature.

Not just a mathemetician's favorite, but also interior designer and architects favorite in some cases. My interior design teacher is very much into the golden mean and believes many things are built based off a golden rectangle.
She actually recommended that we watch the video "Donald Duck in Math Magicland" haha.

[twobluestripes]

Okay, I wanted to organize the rest of the pics kind of by topics, like a topic for each large exhibit and then separate out from those the ones that showed the structure of the building, inside and out. But that turned out to be too hard because they're all really mixed up. I will continue to post them in the order that they were taken.


Walking the front hallway towards the Global Warming exhibit (Rainforest sphere is on the left)



Walking through a sheltered courtyard with seating and a large food cart. Check out the view out the front doors to the de Young!


Walking the back hallway towards the Evolution exhibit, with the Planetarium sphere on the left


Global Warming exhibit: A graph of carbon levels:


Videos describing the effect of heating the globe:

A GIANT BALANCE, like the one you'd use in Chem Lab, can show you how big your carbon footprint is. Just set the sliders to your own activities in traveling and your home electricity. (My family's was worse than I expected)


Which types of transportation are the worst for the environment? Good thing I plan to drive my little car between Orange County and Nor Cal from now on, instead of flying, especially now that gas is getting cheaper. But maybe I'll buy some carbon offsets for my trip to New Zealand next Christmas?


A prototype of a wind turbine for home use. I want one for my roof!


Disposable objects that we really shouldn't use (they fill up the landfills), and what we can use to replace them
(Paper & styrofoam coffee cups, wooden chopsticks, plastic water bottles, and non-recyclable wrapping paper)


A display of California Wildlife and how they're affected by our climate change and pollution. The bear is the last and most famous grizzly of California, and is the bear depicted on our state flag. You can probably call the phone tour from your phone at home (I did it while I was there)!


Whale bones:


Dino bones (actually a cast of dino bones, not the real bones)


Bugs:



A small exhibit about how the new building and operations at the Academy are working to be friendly to the environment. Green Building is so interesting! Example: they used recycled denim blue jeans for the insulation!



The Amazing and Delicious Cafeteria! Seriously, if this caf was a separate restaurant, I'd go there all the time. Great options, while still being mostly healthy and eco-friendly. True cafeteria style, with different counters for soup, sandwhiches, pastas, salads, dessert, etc.


To be continued.... Next up, the Evolution exhibit side with the African Hall dioramas!

[IzzyInWonderland]

That Global Warming exhibit looks so interesting. I just did 2 speeches on it so it definitely piques my interest to see such a neat informative exhibit.

[haunted_hottie]

OOO! I love dioramas!