My son is in love with undersea creatures so we maintain an annual pass at the Seattle Aquarium and go frequently. Recently, the Seattle Aquarium had a special event with an Octonauts story time and a chance to meet Captain Barnacles. Since my son is also a huge Octonauts fan, we made sure to take a special father-son trip to the aquarium for the event.
We arrived at the aquarium a couple of hours early so that we could spend some time in Owen’s favorite place and then get a good spot for the story and meet and greet. The first stop is always the giant tank and the diver. Owen talks about the diver almost every day. The diver feeds the fish and cleans the inside of the tank and will usually interact with the kids quite a bit. Owen loves it.
We then headed over to the touching tanks. Owen loves getting to touch things with his “science finger.” His favorites are the sea stars and anemones.
Then we went looking for Nemo and Dori. We found lots of “Nemos” but fell short on finding Dori this time.
Owen was mesmerized by the spawning tanks and the light filtering through the schools of salmon.
We got a great glimpse of the seals swimming around their tank and even saying hello.c
We even got to watch the sea otters lounging in the great weather.
The Seattle Aquarium does a great job on trying to educate the public on the heath of our oceans and waterways. The recently added this really great wall exhibit about how we can all help protect and conserve our planet and its water.
It was getting close to story time so we headed back to the front of the aquarium. On the way, we stopped off at the gift shop to get an Octonauts toy. Owen and I were both excited to see a Tweak & Giant Squid and so we grabbed her up. Unfortunately, just like with most other toy lines, the female character toys are usually harder to come by so despite wanting a Tweak, we’d not gotten one yet.
We headed over and got a great front row seat for the Octonauts story time. The Seattle Aquarium had taken the Octonauts and the Undersea Eruption book, enlarged the pages, and transferred them on to boards. It made it really easy for everyone to see the pictures. All of the kids really enjoyed the story–the Octonauts have to save a bunch of creatures who live near an undersea volcano that is about to erupt.
After the story reading was over, a queue was formed, and we got to meet Captain Barnacles. We managed to be first in line until a little girl cut in front of us and her parents didn’t stop her. It wasn’t a big deal that we weren’t first, but parents, please teach your children manners and lead by example! When it was our turn, Owen ran over to Captain Barnacles with arms outstretched. Mission success.
For anyone who hasn’t heard of the Octonauts, I have to say, this is a kids’ show that you should not be missing. We like to call the Octonauts “under water Star Trek for toddlers.” Each episode is split in to two segments which each focus on a different under water creature. The Octonauts send an away team, meet and, usually, rescue the new creature, and learn about new sea life. The Octonauts are a diverse group of anthropomorphic animals from all over the world; for example, Peso is a Chilean penguin and the ship’s medic, and Tweak is a generically southern bunny and the ship’s engineer. We love the Octonauts because of the diverse crew that includes strong female characters and the educational components.
There is a full line of Octonauts toys, books, and shows available. I can’t recommend the series enough and the toys are great for bath time! And if you live in or are visiting Seattle, the Aquarium is a great place to visit. They have a lot of Pacific Northwest specific animals that you don’t get to see a lot of at most other aquariums.
