California, part 2

Day 19, 9-28-08

After San Francisco, the next cool thing I wanted to see in California was the Monterrey Bay Aquarium. The Monterrey Bay Aquarium (MBA) was founded primarily by David Packard, of Hewlett-Packard fame and his wife, whose endowment in the laid 1970s laid the foundation for both the aquarium itself and the oceanic research institute that followed it.

Monterrey Bay is also home to the author John Steinbeck, one of my favorites. One of his works entitled "Log from the Sea of Cortez" follows a survey expedition to catalog the marine life along the Pacific Coast along Southern California and Northern Mexico. The work is a fictionalized account by Steinbeck and his friend E.F. Rickets, a naturalist and marine biologist who was one of the first people to catalog the marine life along this coastline. It is my favorite Steinbeck work and seeing the location and environment that inspired it was one of the main motivations for going on this trip.

Monterrey Bay itself is much as I imagined it would be, but actually turned out to be better. Monterrey Bay is marine sanctuary, set asid and protected from fishing to act as a marine nursery for commercially valuable fish species. Fortunate from the MBA and my ideals about Steinbeck's writings, the marine sanctuary preserves intact the pre-exploitation state of the Pacific Coast of North America. It has some of the cleanest waters and most biologically diverse and vibrant marine communities south of Alaska. It also serves as a backdrop for the Pebble Beach PGA championship venue, which I saw from afar.

Anyways, I arrived in Monterey transfixed by the stark contrasts presented between the ecology and climate of Monterrey and that of the San Jose environs I stayed at the previous night. San Jose was warm, sunny and dry, while during the short trip to Monterey it became cloudy, windy, and humid, all within 30 miles and little elevation or rain shadowing that I could detect. Strange place, especially when you consider that I left Monetery by the same route I entered and transitioned back into the Son Jose weather, just as quickly as I had left it.




The Aquarium is a converted sardine cannery, a vestige of a time when sardines fed troops in both world wars along with Depression era Americans. Then the fishery collapsed in the 1950s and the area was largely destitute.

I don't have many images of the aquarium grounds or specimens, because I was altogether too engrossed in the sights and sounds, mobbed by people (Sunday + tourist destination = crowded) or the specimens did not want to cooperate with my photographic efforts. But I got what I could; suffice to say there is alot to see, from squid to fish to otters to salmon.




The indoor aviary was interesting, and housed many native and migratory bird species, all of the which housed here had been rescued or injured.



This exhibit was fun, and consisted of a modelled tidal pool that washed over an indoor observation area that could also be viewed from the outside where I am standing. Notice the people under the plexiglass in the second pic. It was also fun when the groups of 4-years olds were under the canopy and let go their squeals of glee when the water crashed overhead. I moved on quickly after that sensory onslaught.



The penguin area was typically comical, and these characters would not stand still for anything, so my images of them are often blurry.

I ate lunch at the superb cafeteria on site, and decided that this was a place worthy of splurging on good food, as it after all goes to a good cause. $25 worth of a Californian version of the Philly Cheese Steak (no where near greasy enough), carbonated fruit drinks and french bread and clam chowder later.

I paid extra for a behind-the-scenes tour of the facility. Led by a fairly knowledgeable guide, we visited the holding tanks, areas behind the exhibits where the filtration and maintenance took place, the food prep areas, and some of the husbandry, isolation and care units to keep the front residents happy as well as tend to the center's other mission of research and exploration. All in all this tour was very interesting, and while it reminded me of tours I'd done at the School for Environmental Studies, the information was nevertheless insightful and interesting. I'd definitely recommend taking the tour to anyone else who visited the MBA.

One of the most interesting but hardest to photograph attractions is the giant 1-million odd gallon seawater tank that houses many of the facilities large animals. Since the MBA's mission is education more than entertainment, there are no trained animals there beyond training the mammals (mostly) to accept physicals and feeding patterns. The Big Tank houses many species of fish and a few cetaceans, including everything from anchovies to white tipped reef sharks, all swimming continuously in a never ending dance of swimming in circles.



One of the newer exhibits displays a group of 6 sea otters who are able to gambol and cavort amongst a series of interconnected rooms and environments, all interspersed with human-filled hallways and flashbulbs. These characters are notoriously hard to photograph, as their movements are faster and more erratic than the penguins even. But below is my solitary good shot.




Evidently the 6 otters have distinct personalities, fur coats and behaviours that the keepers can pick up on after and differentiate these whirling balls of energy (they eat a quarter of their weight in fish a day! and it's salmon to be ostentatious!) but they all looked like furballs to me.

Another exhibit will open early next year about sea horses and related creatures. Until then though, the MBA is a fascinating place that I learned alot from, and was definitely a highlight of the trip so far.

I rode around Monterey for awhile afterwards, looking as much for a drug store to buy some insoles to ease my aching arches as anything. All in all there's something mysterious and surreal about the Monterey Bay that I can't really put my finger on. Definitely a place I'd like to explore more.

I left the area and headed south along highway 101 for an hour or so and found a hotel. Tomorrow I will visit my Aunt and Uncle in Tehachapi, CA.

Til then!