I don't think you're ready for this jelly.

I think it's safe to say that without a doubt, the various jellyfish on display were my favorite part of the Monterey Bay Aquarium. I haven't had much experience with jellyfish, or jellies, as they are properly called. ('cause they're not fish!) I've been lucky enough to have never been stung by one, and might have caught one or two at the various aquariums I have visited, but other than that, no real jelly time. I was filled with childlike glee when we saw an assortment of moon jellies on our whale watching adventure, but getting to see them up close and personal at the aquarium was fantastic!


First up, the purple striped jelly...






Next up, moon jelly - We saw these on the whale watching trip, but they looked much more pink than white as they floated along.


A zillion little moon jellies...so cute!



Ben was right, the sea nettles were my favorite. It was pretty mesmerizing watching them squish around in their tank.




A better close up of the tentacles...simply amazing!



Here's a (blurry) shot of the sea nettle tank - gives you a better idea of how big it was and more importantly how many of them were in there.


Hard at work, capturing the jelly madness.


I wish this wasn't so blurry...but just to prove we were really there!



Basking in the squishy jelly glow.

lovely, squishy things.

Prepare to get schooled...



Presenting: The adventures of Ben and Bryanne at the Monterey Bay Aquarium!!

Although I didn't know it would be part of the weekend plans, ever since I had become aware of Monterey's aquarium I wanted to go there. I may not be the biggest fan of seafood, but I *love* going to aquariums. When initially discussing potential things to do when I went to visit Mr. Dundee, the aquarium was one of the first things that came up.

The Monterey Bay Aquarium certainly lived up to my expectations and exceeded them. I've been to aquariums before that deal primarily with local wildlife and it was nice to see that here. (Even though I really would have liked to see some clownfish! I will have you know I was a fan pre-finding Nemo. :) )

Ben had his new camera to use, and I was ready to take lots of pictures, so over the course of a day and a half, we took a ton of pictures. Here are some of my favorites - undoubtably this will become a series of entries. There just too much fishy goodness to cram into one.


The giant kelp forest tank was getting a nice scrub down from some friendly scuba dudes.





My favorite anemone - the cute pink strawberry variety.



Starfish - up close and personal.


I had no idea sand dollars looked like this!



Ben's favorite anemones look like something out a dr. suess book.


As does this engaging little critter.


Perch tank wonderland



Up next - Starfish bonanza! They were all members of a touch pool posse, so I gave each of them a little tickle after taking their photos. I figured it was only proper.




This little guy is called a bat star. I have no idea why. Although if he took off flying around to save gotham I certainly wouldn't complain. In fact, that would be pretty awesome.




A whole blurry pile of these blue spotty guys


The colors of this one were particularly striking


Look! They have people at the aquarium too!

A whale of a surprise

When I headed out to California to visit Ben, I knew very little about what events would take place while I was there. I was informed before my arrival that there were "surprises" planned. Of course, I had no complaints about this whatsoever! Who doesn't love surprises?

Friday morning, we were up bright and early. Prior to the trip, Ben asked me if I got seasick (to which I confidently replied "no") and told me for this surprise I would need to bring a sweat shirt, a "woolen hat" and binoculars. I was armed and dangerous when we took off from the bed and breakfast around 8:00 and found ourselves at Fisherman's wharf - The secret was soon out. We were going whale watching! I was most pleased by this news, and excited to spend some time out on the water.

Before long we were enjoying views of swimming sea lions and the occasional floating jelly fish as we headed out into the bay towards deeper waters and potential whales. Ben provides much better description about how fast and far we went...all I know is the wind was in my hair, camera in my hand, and smile on my face.














After a while we got our first glimpse of whale mania - off in the distance we saw the plumes of water from a spouting whale. There were several pods on various side of us. Even being at this distance and capturing little glances of whales as they crested above the water was exciting. We had no idea what was coming next!



After some nice views from a distance, the whales decided to come investigate our boat, and investigate they did! The next hour was one of the most amazing I've ever experienced. The whales swam back and forth under our boat, coming up to investigate on either side, while all the happy humans on board oooh-ed and aaahh-ed and got repeated first hand exposure to the fragrance that is whale breath. (Yes - it's as bad as it sounds)




I think this next view was most striking to me - seeing that whale...looking all whale-y and such. Just like it's supposed to be!


This stunning whale sneeze hit Ben right in the face. Excellent!


The orifice responsible...



Now with all the whale excitement, which resulted in lots of rocking back and forth of the boat, I was a bit surprised when I realized I wasn't feeling so hot. Maybe it was all the whale breath in the air, or perhaps the slightly unsavory quiche I had eaten for breakfast, but before too long I abandoned my post, snapping pictures and gazing at the whales and instead found myself leaning over the back railing, puking my guts out. Not one of my proudest moments, but amusing in retrospect. Naturally I immediately felt better. (Maybe it was just the quiche...) I was a bit embarrassed, but more than anything surprised. I've been on plenty of boats before, small ones included and have never gotten sea sick before. First time for everything I guess!!

After I sat down for a whale, took a brief nap on Ben's shoulder, and drank some water I was feeling better and able to enjoy the remainder of the excursion.

Here's Ben, doing his best "Holy shit, it's a whale!" pose.

Happy (albeit slightly chilly) whale watchers.



Tune in next time for "Adventures at the Monterey Bay Aquarium"

The adventure begins

Back at home after a truly wonderful weekend in Monterey. I want to make sure to give all the happenings their proper limelight in blog-land, so I'll break things up into several posts.

I flew out early, early, early, on Thursday morning to meet Ben in San Francisco. I knew he had some surprises planned for us for the weekend, but really wasn't sure what he had up his sleeve. It's been hard with him all the way off in California this past month, so I was very excited to see him none the less.

He picked me up at the airport, we grabbed some lunch, made a quick stop at the house where he is staying (where he packed a suitcase) and we were off! The weekend adventures had begun!

First stop was the Stanford Shopping Center where we visited Sprinkles Cupcakes. I am what one might call a cupcake enthusiast, and Ben knowingly thought going there might be something I would get a kick out of. He was right!



Apparently Sprinkles is so fantastic that we had to wait in line just to go inside! It was like some fancy night club masquerading as a humble cup cake bakery.

He tried the coconut, while I went for the chocolate marshmallow.
Delicious!!




Once we were armed with delicious cupcakes, we hit the road. Ben knew where we were going, but I was still totally in the dark, so I just enjoyed the ride and the company. We first enjoyed the landscapes and curvy roads of the Santa Clara mountains, but before long we were driving along the pacific coast, wind in our hair and salty air in our noses.

We pulled off for a while to do a little exploring - Ben was anxious to try to capture some wild life with his new camera. We found a group of uber lazy sea lions, an accommodating gull of some sort and some interesting sea grass.




We continued down the coast through Santa Cruz and other towns as well as lots of agricultural areas on into Monterey. I got very excited as we drove through Monterey, as Ben kept insisting he was only looking for a gas station to stop at to use the restroom. We arrived at the Centrella inn, our destination for the weekend...