Something fishy here

Monday 16th

When I arranged to meet up in the lobby at 10 to go out together, I hadn't realised That this would mean I only had a few hours sleep. None the less I managed to get myself up, showered and dressed by that time. No Hangover, but unsurprisingly, still tired.

There were 5 of us who went to the aquarium together. I had been recommend to do this by someone back home and another conference goer had been earlier.It was around 11 when we got there after 2 tube legs, and there was quite a long queue, since it is a public holiday in Japan. it moved reasonably quickly and I found I could get a seniors discount (only $20).

 The building has 5 stories and you go to the top and spiral down. In hindsight there were many tanks that we viewed multiple times and it would have been better not to fight the crowds to get a look at the start of the tour.

Many of the tanks including the main one  (PacificOcean) are 5 stories high so you start with dolphins and seals at the surface and finish with crabs and bottom feeder down below.

The big tank is really big - no really big, more than you are thinking of - 9 metres deep with 5400 tonnes of water and made of foot think acrylic glass.

There are numerous types of rays and sharks including a whale shark and also some other large fish. I took mostly videos as still photos were (a), a bit hard to capture some of the faster moving creatures and (b) not really able to give the fell of such huge fish tanks and the multitude of creatures in them.

There were tanks with fish from different regions including Bass Straight and the Barrier Reef as well and both river and sea areas in Japan.

 We then left the main building for some smaller exhibits including a seal pool, then jelly fish and later arctic fish.

There were some land animals on display as well - a coati, and carabanyi at the start of the tour, water birds in various tanks and at the end, a sloth, penguins and more otters.

There were at least 3 types of rays in the big tank. One was more delta shaped and flapped its "wings" like a bird - in sync. Another used alternating large ripples and a third used lots of small ones just at the edges.






  They even had the equivalent of a petting zoo at the end where you could touch the fish and rays.

We had agreed to meet up at 1-15 giving us a couple of hours but I was out 30 minutes before that.  The 5th member turned up a bit late and we were all hungry. We went to the nearby shopping mall and after rejecting 3 restaurants due to queues just to get in, went back to the one by the entrance when everyone had butter chick and OJ.

We took a different route back with 3 of us getting off to walk to the long shopping mall that is at right angles to the street where the hotel sits. We had seen a bit of it from time to time but late at night when the shops were closed.  We went 1 stop too far so had to walk back about 10 minutes to find the start. We parted at a discount store since we went shopping for different things and I headed back on my own. I had arrived at what I though was going to be the hotel street to find I'd only gone halfway. With all the walking around the aquarium previously my knee was reminding me that it has never completely healed from hockey injuries. Nothing I could do about it as the subways were just as far on the other side.

I limped my way back, stopping at a big multi story Department store "Don Quixote" commonly just called Donkey, and bought a blue tooth headset for my phone (to replace a similar one I'd lost some time ago at home) We had been in there at 5am but I decided not to buy any thing in that state just in case. It cost about $25 which was quite a lot less than at home.

Thomas and Patrick had left for the airport earlier to fly to HK. THomas sent a text saying his flight was delayed and something about a typhoon warning. Since I'm heading there tomorrow, I'm a bit worried about my flight as well.

The other 3 of us plus 3 more met for dinner and finished up at a Yaki restaurant, where I had a Japanese pancake. Each table had a hot plate but this was for keeping the food warm and they were delivered already prepared.

It was a relatively early night and I was asleep before 11pm.