the oceanarium

Near the end of our trip, we spent a day in Lisbon, the capital and the largest city in Portugal. At Parque Eduardo VII we happened upon the Winter Wonderland festival and holiday markets, and toured the Estufa Fria, a "cool greenhouse" built into what had been a 19th century basalt quarry. Late in the day we had tickets to the Oceanarium, an entire world in and of itself. Tucker asked to write about that part of the trip, below!

There's some stimulation of curiosity that travel provokes, the fascinating work of puzzling out a new place, the long-awaited pleasure of getting away. There's also the chance to drive an SUV on roads built for burros, to make worried faces from high places and to help abstract impressions become realistic paintings. Home again, grateful for clothes dryers and ice cubes, bourbon reserves and our own mattresses, glad that everyday life here is not something any of us are often looking to escape.

guest post, by Tucker (age 13)

The Lisbon Oceanarium was many things for us - an unforgettable and amazing aquarium, an escape from the rain, the place from which Hank’s new Black-Footed Penguin stuffy came. We first entered the saltwater exhibits via a bridge high above the port. I was struck by worry that the whole Oceanario would be crowded when I saw how many people were at the first viewing tank. Fortunately, the visitors dispersed tremendously as we went further into the building. We gazed at and observed the giant octopus; we descried the leafy sea dragons, and we recognized some rays. The Oceanarium formed a ‘+’ shape and in the center was the biggest aquarium, with lots of schooling fish and a few sharks. Without a doubt the most interesting room we came upon had high ceilings and slide-shaped ice blocks - a few seabirds flew about and penguins chilled out under some false rock outcrops. After we were done in the Oceanarium we were planning on visiting a separate wing of the building, holding an exhibit titled ‘Forests Underwater.' Little did we know this was the largest (42,000 gallons) freshwater aquascape in the world. Just before we walked in I took a moment to read the sign saying ‘Aquascaped by Takashi Amano.' “Wow,” I said to dad, “these tanks were scaped by 天野尚, a very famous guy. I've read about him in library books.” But I was wrong, it was not five, not ten fish tanks but ONE giant, U-shaped, fish-and-plant-loaded work of art. Seeing this really nailed into me (and I assume mom and dad as well) that nature truly can be brought indoors. In my eyes, this was the greatest thing I have seen in a long time. I’d call it my happy place if it weren’t 3,848 miles away from home. I am grateful beyond words for our trip to Europe, and I look forward to seeing other parts of the continent. At some point in the near future there may be a blog post regarding an aquarium of my own! 

Click here to watch Amano’s team building the tank- it’s a process all right!