Journeys›Photograph

A Saturday at the Academy of Sciences

·California Academy of Sciences·#family#san-francisco#aquarium#museum#california-academy-of-sciences#golden-gate-park
The blurred foreground shows a modern building with a glass roof, a suspended skeleton, and silhouetted people.

Took the girls down to Golden Gate Park for a Saturday at the California Academy of Sciences — the Renzo Piano building on Music Concourse Drive, open since 2008. A T. rex skeleton hangs over the entry, jaws pointed straight down at the ticket line, which set the tone before we'd paid.

First stop was a science demonstration with the sun projected huge on a dark wall, flares and all. Both girls sat through it on the floor, the little one pointing at things I couldn't follow.

From there the Steinhart Aquarium took over the rest of the visit. The white alligator was out on its rock in the swamp exhibit, not moving a muscle, and the girls hung on the railing over it for a long time. The big coral reef tank was the other draw — the little one wanted up to touch the glass. We finished at the moon jellies in the Water Planet gallery, lit green in a round tank taller than either kid.

A person and a child watch a large glowing partial solar eclipse projected onto a dark wall.Two young children are seated in a dimly lit room, with one child pointing upward.Two children look over a railing at a large albino alligator resting on a rock in a dark enclosure.Numerous fish, including yellow-tailed species, swim around diverse coral formations in a vibrant blue aquarium.A man holding a child smiles at the camera in front of a large aquarium with rocks.Two people watch many glowing green jellyfish in a large cylindrical aquarium in a dark room.

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