Our trip to The Sea Life London Aquarium went swimmingly
A couple of years back, my husband, Ma Puce and I spent Ma Puce’s 1st birthday visiting The Sea Life London Aquarium. Ma Puce had a fabulous time and I think she did her bit to keep the fish and sea life as amused by her as she was by them.
So imagine my joy when almost two years to the day we were offered the chance to visit The Sea Life London Aquarium again. Not only is it a wonderful experience for children of all ages, but for me it was the perfect opportunity to mark the passage of time and see how differently the new visit panned out compared to the last one.
This time Ma Puce and I invited along my fabulous friend V, her son and fave pal of MP’s, T and his little baby brother H for what proved another fun-filled visit.
Now something I feel I must say right at the top of this ‘ere review is that this place ain’t cheap! There’s no two ways about it. It just isn’t – you can check out the ticket prices and the cheapest way of snaffling them using the link at the end of this post.
But, and this is a massive BUT, it really is a great way to spend some top quality time with your children. I think an added bonus for parents is that unlike attending a more child-centric experience, this really is something that everyone in the family can enjoy and get something from.
A great way to learn about sea life
The walls are adorned with copious amounts of information about each of the creatures in the aquariums and hugely important ecological facts and stats about conservation efforts that need to be made to ensure that all these beautiful creatures and the rest of us can live happily on this planet.
One of the highlights for us was the very first thing you experience as you enter the Aquarium – The Shark Walk. It’s a large glass walkway over the shark tank, which is inhabited by an an array of different sharks, who swim around literally inches from the soles of your feet.
Ma Puce was a little hesitant to step onto the Shark Walk at first, but once I knelt down and had my arm around her, she felt confident enough to marvel at the thrilling sight of the Brown Sharks and Black Tip Reef Sharks as they glided through the water beneath us.
Watching the Rays and Skates in their open top tank also brought a smile to all our faces. In part because of their gracefulness and in part because they seem to be smiling right back atcha. And who knew that Rays belong to the same family as Sharks? Not me, until I read this fact at The Aquarium!
We also learnt that we shouldn’t eat Skate in restaurants as they are overfished and as they live for a long time and reproduce slowly it can take a long time for a population to recover from overfishing.
Mesmerised… for a moment
I could literally spend hours mesmerised by tropical fish, there is something so visually stimulating and yet at the same time soothing about them. Unfortunately for me, with a 3 year old in tow I had minutes rather than hours!
Talking of three year olds and quite possibly slightly younger children too, you do need to put some effort in to keeping their attention on the aquariums. Especially if they have a pal of the same age with them. Whilst a baby or toddler is easily captivated by the flitting and gliding of the fish, little children are very capable of getting so caught up in high jinx and mischief that they can get easily sidetracked from the main event.
That said, the terapins had us all in rapture as some of them played merrily in their aquarium, whilst a couple of their number were sunbathing elegantly on a rock under a solarium lamp, looking very much like a seaside picture from Saint Tropez from the roaring 20s.
One little low point for us was the absence of the penguins. Unfortunately Ma Puce’s friends from nursery had got very excited ahead of our trip and whipped her up into a frenzy of excitement about seeing penguins. Turns out that when we visited they had ‘gone on holiday’ whilst their zone was re-done.
The highlight of my trip to The Sea Life London Aquarium
Still, my spirits were lifted in the extreme by being able to place my hands in real footprints of a penguin which were displayed in ice on the wall by the penguin enclosure. Honestly, I reverted to being a small child as my heart filled with glee at being able to do something that would have before seemed impossible!
And that shows the kind of thoughtfulness that has gone into creating The Sea Life London Aquarium. The team really have thought of just about everything that you could wish to experience, witness and learn about all aspects of Sea Life.
I noticed in the brochure that they also offer special packages, such as snorkeling with the sharks and becoming a Marine Biologist for the day. So that’s my husband’s next birthday gift sorted then.
We thoroughly enjoyed our trip to The Sea Life London Aquarium and I can foresee us returning again before too long. It’s a great place to go if you are visiting London for a few days with the family or as a destination for a birthday celebration with a difference.
If you would like to pay this wonderful place a visit you can find out all about it, including ticketing options by visiting the Superbreak website.
Disclosure: We were given complimentary tickets to go along and experience The Sea Life London Aquarium by Superbreak. The opinions expressed in my review are 100% my genuine thoughts on how this trip panned out for us.
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