Walking underwater at the Dubai Aquarium

Happy family at the zoo

We recently walked underwater at the Dubai Aquarium and Underwater Zoo. This amazing place can be found in the Dubai Mall (yes, another outragious thing found in the Malls over here). Although the experience didn't last that long, it was totally awesome! One thing to note, is that this aquarium has been awarded the largest acrylic panel in the world by Guinness World Records. Cool hugh! Only in Dubai!

Walking underwater

As you will see in some of the photos, you actually walk through an acrylic tube so that you are walking underwater. It is fun to see how many people can fit in this tube...including people of the cloth. It is kind of funny, but I am starting to get used to seeing the women in their black attire everywhere. (I feel bad for the gals that only have the slits for their eyes to see. In the second picture the gal in the front is adjusting her face mask so she can see. This actually happens a lot with the full face cover up. Personnally, I would be completely annoyed with having to do that. I think that God knew if he put me in a Muslim family, that I wouldn't last long, so I thank him for America everyday).

I absolutely love this photo. Mr. Big is showing Big Buddy
how this fish is see through. Look at it's cute little smiling
face on the glass!

These piranha look hungry!

It was especially interesting to see that sharks like to hide out in the dark part of the tube. Every once in a while, one would shoot out and swim amongst the other fish. Mr. Big and I are still wondering why the sharks don't eat the other fish?  As you can see, the water and lights made the whole experience magical. I think we could of pulled up a lawn chair and stayed in the tube for hours! Once you make it through the tube, you are plopped out into an underwater zoo where you see all sorts of interesting fish. One of our favorites were the piranha. What a strange fish. The very first thing I noticed was that they were all perfectly separated the exact same distance (a designers dream). And they didn't even budge (when Big Buddy placed his little hand on the glass I could of swore that I saw a few of the fish blink in anticipation). The top of the aquarium was open, so someone could of plunked their hand in. It was tempting, I must admit...but all the signs with chewed off fingers deterred me from doing it. ;)

Something else I found interesting were these underwater sand worms. They would just pop up out of the sand and sway in the water. Look at their cute little faces. Almost snake like... I wonder if these are out in the ocean (OMG. That was probably what I had caught between my toes the other day at the beach when I walked out into the ocean...I am starting to feak out now!)?

Underwater sand worms

This aquarium had tons of sting rays floating around. They are so beautiful as they swim and float by. Each one we watched seemed more amazing than the last...that was until we came upon this special sting ray. As you can see, this special one had quite the personality. The face on this little guy actually caused me to pee myself a little from all the laughing. We have officially renamed this one "Dork Ray"! I would go back and pay just to see this guy again!

Aaaahhh! I'm a dork fish!

Upstairs from the underwater zoo are the creepy crawlies. We saw all sorts of snakes and spiders. Have I mentioned that I have yet to see a single spider in Dubai yet! Strange. We did get to see a camel spider. I refuse to put a picture of it on this blog since they give me nightmares. Google it if you like scary!

Next, we hope to swim with some dolphins! I will keep you posted!