National Aquarium -- Hidden Kid Treasure

Summer is kicking off with Memorial Day weekend, and for fellow-moms in need of something to do in the area, I'm going to start blogging my favorites. First stop: The National Aquarium. When the Baltimore Aquarium gets all the attention, who even knew there was a National Aquarium one block away from the Monument? Surprisingly, it has some great fish to see. They have sharks, jellyfish, sea horses, sea turtles and so much more. My favorite was the lion fish. Isn't this a stunning fish?

They've got freshwater fish, marine fish, and reptiles.
They had alligators too! Caelan's favorite was the seahorse.

Price of the Baltimore Aquarium $29.95 per adult; National Aquarium $9.00 per adult! Micah was $4 (kids ages 3-11) and Caelan was free. If you have young kids and live in Northern Virginia, you are totally getting a bang for your buck. Plus, you're in the car only 35 minutes! For parking, before 10 AM, you can drive straight up and park on Constitution (between 14 & 15th) and you will have no problems! So much better to drive direct than park, pay, and wait for the Metro, especially when you can nap the kids on the way home, if you need to.


For lunch, you can walk two blocks to Pennsylvania Ave and turn right to the food court at the Post Office Pavilion. For free (well, technically your tax dollars pay for it) you can go up to ring the clock tower and get some of the best views of the city.


I like to travel with kids high speed low drag, which means all we pack is two juice boxes, a diaper, and a change of underpants and shorts for Micah (in case we can't find the potty in time). If you have ten extra minutes, find a small cooler and pack a lunch -it'll save you $1o for the kid's lunch. It's worth it, because they offer Sushi, Indian, Greek, which was DELISH for mom and dad -- but the kids chose a hot dog from the deli, that wasn't even good.

It's cool to see the history of the buildings you sit in.
Here's what the Old Post Office used to look like.

It was a great day. You can skip lunch in the Pavilion, and just do a nice walk to the National Gallery of Art Sculpture and have lunch there. My favorite thing Micah said when I showed him some of the art pieces in the lawn, he said, "Why do they call that art?" I laughed, and told him that was a good question! So we went to see the fountains instead--much more exciting to see water being shot out from every direction!


By the way, my camera broke so for a little while, until I can get a new one...I'll have to come up with creative pictures to blog so that you're seeing what I'm seeing. Hope you decide to make this fun half-day trip. It was a lot of fun!