We always enjoy coming to the Austin Aquarium! Now that they added the Lemur and Kangaroo experiences it's even better. They even have a kookaburra! I will definitely be back soon! read more

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This is my first interactive Aquarium. It's very neat not only do you learn about the different animals you can feed them and touch them as well. read more

Austin Aquarium is a wonderful place to bring the kids! Even our littles, ages 1 to 3, had s lot to participate in. We loved the aviary and appreciated Kalista's help. We'll come back! read more

This is a small but fun aquarium. Very hands on with lots of fish to touch and hold! Great for kids and the employees working there are super friendly and seem to enjoy working there! Unlike any aquarium I have ever been to! read more

Awesome aquarium and super friendly staff. Shoshana helped us in the bird exhibit and it was great experience. Everything is super interactive, our 1 year old loved it! read more

Different set up as we know before. Indoor aquarium. Lost of activities to do with kids such as feeding birds, feeding iguanas, holding snacks, and others. All of them you need tokens which cost money. There is a little food court with tables to seat and eat. Bring your snacks because there is not much to buy for lunch. read more

Austin Aquarium - Aquariums Near Me - Austin, Texas

Ok, I admit, we were not quite feeling it when we drove up to a strip shopping center, but I am very impressed with what they did with the space. It's a hands-on experience from start to finish. However, what really earns this place the stars is the lemur experience. Will keeps it super fun and educational as these little lemurs jump on you, play around and cause all of your stress to just flee from your body--it's better and cheaper than a therapy session. Don't think. Just do it. read more

The Austin aquarium was not an enjoyable experience. The first thing I noticed was that it is very smelly. I question the animals there especially the iguanas that are sitting out you are allowed to touch them and it seems like they are drugged and should not be touched at all. This place is not suitable for animals and is too small. Please take better care of the animals. read more

Went here for my birthday (which they didn't know) and encountered the nicest staff ever. The guy at the front desk was so kind and helpful with our first time there. The two women in Ring-Tailed Lemurs exhibit were so informative about the lemurs! They answered my questions in depth and were so nice. Will definitely be coming back! Thank you so much for making my birthday awesome! read more

This is the worst Aquarium I have ever been to. All of the animals there look extremely unhappy and they are all in cramped, dirty conditions. Not worth the $17 I spent. It was built inside of an old supermarket. Cages packed full of animals, fish packed into aquariums...so sad. So many of the fish were shedding their scales. Do not go here. read more

Five stars for the customer service! Mandi was awesome with our kids. I just wish it was in a better facility because they have so many neat things in that building read more

We enjoyed our visit! There seems to be dedicated staff and volunteers also the animals seem happy. The Aquarium is very clean and sanitary only gave 4 stars because there's really not much signage on all the different kinds of animals your looking at and where they are native to. Just an idea but it would be cool if they had a donate link or something to scan because I definitely thought about it during the trip. read more

Ok so I went to see this place after a few years of it being open and they have made amazing improvements. everything was very clean and updated. Im actually pretty happy with this place now. read more

I went here with my friends the other day. Overpriced and depressing as hell. Fishy smell all throughout the building and animals are in spaces much too small for their size and quantity. I feel bad for these poor creatures; they're definitely not being treated humanely. I guess I shouldn't expect too much from a for-profit aquarium. read more

Not really a good experience. Animals seem to be underfed and the location of the aquarium is off, it's in the middle of a strip mall. That should already be a red flag for anyone who's like me... read more

We finally came to the Aquarium for the first time! I have read mixed reviews and the admission is on the pricey side! We were able to go for half off each ticket and that was worth it! We got to gently touch so many animals and even feed a few! One of the employees, Ashley, made our experience SUPER fun when she brought over some extra Koi fish food to feed! We felt so lucky to get to feed them more! Another employee, Devin, walked around with fun animals to observe and pet! We loved that! He was so passionate about the animals and showed a lot of care for them. Feeding the birds was probably my favorite! We had at least 5 birds in our hands nibbling at a time! This was done with one of the employees and they make sure the birds stay safe from kiddo feet! We will definitely go again and would absolutely recommend if you can find a discount. There's a groupon right now (10/15/2018) and we are planning to get an annual family pass! My kids loved it, it's right down the road and perfect for when the weather keeps you indoors! Bring some snacks and stay a while! We were there for 4 hours today to stay out of the rain! read more

Great place to take 5 and under kids. We took our two grandkids and they had a blast for 3 1/2 hours. Fed stingrays, parrots, parakeets, tortoise and sharks. Open top fish tanks and the kids could really explore. I did find it on the pricy side though. read more

Nope. Save your money. If you are trying to teach kids about sea creatures / marine life this is not the place or the way to do it. There's plenty of documentaries, free interactive websites, live cams or even apps. There was no sunlight I could see, only dirty cramped cages for the birds and reptiles. There are barely any staff supervising visitors, not even around the areas where you can touch animals like sting rays. It must be stressful for the animals to be stuck in a tiny cage / aquarium (away from their natural habitat) and some of them get to be poked by visitors all day. I feel really really sorry for the animals that are kept here, they should be in an animal sanctuary. read more

Big shout out to The Austin Aquarium ! Alex Trierweiler and the gracious staff were amazing! What a fun experience for my grandchildren! The exhibits were filled with happy, healthy critters eager to meet us. The facility was clean and welcoming. A great summers afternoon! Nina Turley read more

After seeing certain reviews for this place, I was apprehensive about checking it out. I finally took the plunge since I live right down the road from it, and I can say I had a pleasant time. The variety of animals you'll see is nice, from sea horses to eels, to stingrays you can pet to Iguanas and bunnies that you can hangout with. The aquarium offers quite a bit of interactivity with the animals which is also really cool. They have 2 aviaries, one with mainly just Parakeets, the other with Iguanas, doves, I think a peacock, and a couple other kinds of birds. These are big walk in areas, where you can pet them, feed them, and even get pooped on if you're lucky. They have bunnies you can pet, as well as parrots that you can hold. Lemurs and sloths are also around, though interactions weren't going on when I was there. They had a tank with a shrimp that'll eat away your dead skin, and you can feed multiple kinds of fish, with stingrays that you can pet, and even sharks available to feed. Turtles, ducks, and otters are also running around. Overall the interactivity really adds to the character of the place and the animals are all quite friendly. Informative screens and posters are everywhere to inform you about the animals. Though it's in a strip mall, I think they make good use of the space. This is definitely a great place to take kids, with bountiful events for them. Now, onto the things that weren't so good. Price of admission is a little steep concerning the size of the place, and the tokens, oh man, those are way too much. Tokens are basically how you get food to feed the animals as well as certain interactions, and 1 token is 4 bucks, and from there it goes up quite steeply. Overall it's a good time, though I do feel it's more expensive than it could be. So if you have the extra money to spare, I'd say it's worth the trip. read more

How is it that we have millions of people here but we can't get a decent aquarium or zoo? Save your money, there's not much you can do or see here that you couldn't get by going to the local austin aquariums (fish stores) and the local exotic pet stores. Waaaay over priced, and shouldn't be able to call it self an "aquarium", more like a petting zoo with water. Somebody please get our state capitol a budget that allots for an aquarium on par with the one in Corpus Christie. read more

I brought my 1 year old here and we had a good time. The only thing I don't like is the use of the plastic containers to hold food for the various animals. I only hope that they recycle these, especially given what their mission is about. I wonder if they can switch to a different means of containing the food, because this is such a neat thing to do. read more

Although the kids had fun for about an hour this was a very disappointing visit. The first problem was that the web site offered discounts for on line orders but the price at the door was cheaper. The fee problem didn't end there because the actual cost for 2 children and 2 seniors was different from the one on the door. The museum itself was dingy, shabby and in need of maintenance. read more

Okay i don't even know where to start! My husband desided to surprise our boys this Past Saturday. Knowing that they love the sea life we planed a trip to the Aquarium. We called ahead to make sure they were opended and this sweet lasy answer the phone and gives us information about hours and rates.. When we arrived the Kids rate had gone up by like $2... when we try to talk to what looked like a manager, she just told us to give her a min. Bc she was on the phone. Then left and never came back.. after waiting we just payed and went in. At first if was your typical aquarium like form. They aslo had a decent stingray Tank. The aquarium was nice but smelled HORRIBLE... there was trash every where. Giftshop was a disaster. Employees seem to have and attitude. I will give it half a star if possible. read more

The kids enjoyed this place very much. It's a great place for animal Interaction. However, those activities cost extra money to do. It's pricey but Groupon saved us money on admission tickets. read more

Had my daughters 3rd birthday here and it couldn't have been a better experience! Everything was perfect! Alex did a wonderful job taking our crew around for interactions with the stingrays, fish, & reptiles! Thank you Alex for making sure my girl had a birthday she will never forget! read more

This place is scummy. Animals drinking from dirty water dishes. There don't appear to be places for stressed or tired animals to go hang out when they're over it. Enclosures are small. The whole experience is uncomfortable. read more

I am not someone who comes to Yelp to write negative reviews. But after today's visit to this aquarium, I just had to. The only reason I gave this place 2 stars, and the only good thing about our experience today, was that every employee I came into contact with was very friendly and pleasant. The young man in the bird exhibit was very kind to my children and I appreciated that. But the positive points end there. For starters- when my family arrived, the line was all the way out of the door and IN THE PARKING LOT. Yes, my children and I literally stood where cars were flying by because that's where the line was. Thankfully we survived and made it through the door only to find that the prices on the website and at the door do not match. That was a bummer, but not the end of the world. After paying a little more than expected, we made our way inside. There's not much to this place. It's extremely crowded, hot, and smelly. It's the worst aquarium I've ever been to and totally not worth the $15 bucks a person we paid. It's almost like a sad petting zoo where people are walking around dressed as princesses trying to upsell you their birthday party packages. I was really disappointed in the lack of variety of fish as well. Needless to say, this was our first and last visit to the Austin Aquarium. Next time we will make the drive to Dallas! read more

This is a very nice little aquarium with a lot of learning for the children we visited this one a couple times and the one in San Antonio they have a good variety of sea life and it is set up to teach. read more

I'm a UT Biology graduate student, so I was really excited to see an Aquarium coming to Austin. I made it there today, expecting the best having read nothing into it. It's really, really bad. Bad enough to made a post for the first time. Around half of the displays don't have any signage depicting what's in the tanks. The other half generally either have tablets which haven't been set up and just show a menu or short uninformative descriptions riddled with grammatical and spelling errors ("captcuring" prey). Many of the tanks have an open-air design which is generally fine for some displays, but there seems to have been absolutely zero thought put into what animals go where or which should be available for kids to touch. There's one tank that's open to anyone to touch, except for the signs stating "NO TOUCHING, FISH BITE". Why is it open, then? There are a million kids running around all the time. Don't leave that open. Speaking of kids, they surround any petting tank. The animals clearly have no place to go. They have no hiding locations and pretty much nothing else in the tanks. Some tanks have feeding options, but the food people put in the tanks for them wasn't even taken up by the animals after five minutes of at least a dozen passing it. They clearly don't want or need the extra food and are distressed enough to pass it by since it usually comes along with tiny grabbing fingers. This brings me to the issue I'm most concerned about; I'm not a huge PETA nut, nor a vegetarian, but some of the animals are housed in conditions bordering on abusive. There's a massive octopus housed in a tank that could fit in a person's home. There's a tank of rays with a solitary iguana floating around without a place to land or warm itself. Seriously, *why* is there an iguana in the ray tank? They have an employee whose job seems to be keeping it in the tank. This tank is also swarmed with kids, and they could easily take it out in a second with even watchful nearby parents. Near this "exhibit" they have two upcoming displays for Asian Otters and seals. The exhibits are also very open with low walls and a very tiny space. If this is where they plan to keep the animals without SIGNIFICANT modification, I'd absolutely consider it abusive. The building is in a strip mall to begin with, it's not like there's going to be a lot of room to expand and I can't see where else they'd keep the animals. Please, if the management sees this at all: DON'T bring mammals here. Please. In the second half of the "aquarium" they have a songbird tent and several reptiles. Many of the reptile tanks have fake vegetation. One iguana had shoved itself to the absolute ceiling of its tank where it could barely be seen to get any amount of heat from the pathetic lamp. The frog tanks had color changing lights for the minor benefit of small children, to the detriment of the frogs themselves. There were a few dark printed posters with information on Texas water animals, which could barely be seen due to lighting. I'm great with dim lighting at an aquarium, but plan your space accordingly. Again, there was clearly the bare minimum of planning and thought to ANYTHING at this business other than cost savings. I was really excited about an aquarium here. There's clearly a desire for it; it was swamped the entire time I was there, with a line out the door. The staff was all great, and I have no issue with them. However, anyone involved with the planning and design of the location is either utterly incompetent or uncaring. This place isn't worth your money, it isn't worth your time (I can't see spending more than an hour here), and it's borderline-leaning-towards abusive, especially if they get marine mammals. Honestly, please don't get mammals here. read more

Really enjoyed the time at the aquarium. Social distancing is hard with children not understanding to keep 6 feet apart. My grandson really enjoyed it. read more

Our family went today after purchasing our $99 membership. Bought the best one hoping to use the guest passes for grandparents and other family. Unfortunately I feel duped for paying the $99 up front based on their advertising. It took up about 30 min to go through the whole thing, even my 2 yo was not impressed. The play area was so dark I was afraid to even let my child play in there since I could not see him well. Cabela's has a better fish tank. This place was depressing and not even close to being finished (I hope). trying to get our money back :-( read more

Bottom Line: It's probably acceptable if you're 6 years old or younger. This aquarium is in a strip mall next to a thrift shop. The entrance to the aquarium has an unfinished and unprofessional feel. There were taped up signs letting you know which line to get into. The whole place looks like they bought an "Open Your Very Own Aquarium!" kit online for $5,000. There was quite a bit of repetition in the fish on display. "Look, more starfish!" The fish displays were either (1) not labeled (2) labelled "coming soon" or (3) had LCD signs that looked like those cheap electronic photo frames that rotate your photos every two seconds. I kept wondering if the sea anemones were dead or alive. It was hard to say. A couple of them really looked like they had expired. There were touch pools where you could pick up a starfish or touch a similar creature. They sell fish food for the kids to throw. I guess that's fun. Whee. I think I saw a seahorse cry. There was a room with birds where the staff was putting the birds on people's fingers. It seemed like a somewhat fun experience. I felt sorry for the birds and didn't go any closer. Listen, for $16, you have to know that you're not getting into Sea World, people. Don't kid yourself. You don't get touch screens and interactive videos and dancing fish shows. An aquarium is an expensive operation to run. And Yelp reviews should be based on what you can realistically expect for the money. For $16, this might be just about right. That being said, calling this place an aquarium may be technically true, but McDonald's is also technically a "restaurant." Some things maybe just shouldn't exist unless you can spend the money to do them right. Save your money if you can and try to take the kids to a better aquarium. Austin, this just ain't it. read more

Boo - totally disappointing :( I'll preface this by saying the place just barely opened so I'll try to cut them some slack (and not leave them with only 1 star). That said, here's my opinion.... First, the place was wrecked. It's winter break and its been packed so I try to let it slide, but there are definitely some hazards. Water is on all of the floors (from being splashed over the sides of the "petting ponds" and some of the surfaces are slick, so watch out! My young daughter slipped a few times. Second, the place is pretty tiny. I guess I should have realized just based on the size of the building, but we went slow and REALLY took our time, and still finished the whole thing in 45 minutes. We were like....uhhhhh, is that it? yes, yes it is. Third, some of it isn't even open. The snack bar in the back was closed. The kids' play area (which actually looked pretty cool) was closed, and the place to buy stingray food was closed. There were also lots of missing animals (like the seal exhibit, where there were no seals until sometime in 2014, according to a sign). What the hell?? I wondered if the place was only opened for a "soft opening" (meaning not everything is fully functional), but everything indicated they were really open "for real" so I have no idea why so many things were closed. Fourth, the petting enclosures were terrible. The water was cloudy and disgusting and most of the "petting" stuff was just starfish. There were a few stingrays, but they were tiny and stayed so close to the bottom of the tanks that you can't reach that far. Very lackluster. Fifth....the birds. This had the possibility of being our FAVORITE part of the place. They have an enclosure with lots of birds where you can go inside, see, "hold" (if they'll jump on you), and pet. SO many things went wrong with this. First, they didn't let my husband and I (and our twin girls) in until well after another group had already entered the place. So we were just standing there forever until the attendant finally acknowledged us and let us into the cage-like enclosure. Then, we were there for about 2 minutes before they kick us all out to let the next group in! We were like, "What the hell, we just got in here!?" I tried to protest, that we should be allowed to stay with the next group since we were admitted so late, but the guy didn't care. The girls liked looking at the birds, but never got to see one up close, never got to pet one, and we got ZERO pictures....we had literally just gotten in there!!! Plus, everyone had these food cups. As we were being kicked out, I asked the guy, "what's the deal with the food? where were those???" since the birds ONLY go to people with the food (makes sense). The guy said you had to buy them outside the enclosure for $3. The thing is, they sell them on the "exit" side of the enclosure instead of the "entrance" side. WTF? Makes no sense! We didn't even know we could buy the food until as we're being kicked out! After the birds, the remainder of the stuff is all reptiles. It sucked. A couple snakes. A couple spiders. And you're done. That's it. Spit into the ridiculously overpriced gift shop full of total crap. So, yes. Totally lackluster and very, very disappointing. I will not be back again. : ( read more

Disappointing is putting it nicely. Definitely was rolled by the Facebook hype and pictures. Like others have said, it dark, smelly and lacking. I think our 2.5y/o son would have gotten more out of pet smart. What blew me away is the teenage girl dressed as a mermaid in the cloudy gross water.... I'm here trying to teach my kid about nature and educate him, and your best exhibit is that?! Not worth the expensive tickets. read more

I should preface this review by saying I'm from Northern California, so any aquarium will automatically be benchmarked against the Monterey Bay Aquarium, hands down the best in the country. That said, even if I'd never been to another aquarium, there was so much about this place that was disappointing and at times, concerning. Despite the location (in a former anchor store space in a strip mall), I wanted to give it a chance. However, the moment I entered, I was struck by two things: 1) what other Yelpers have pointed out, which was an overwhelming smell of dead fish, and 2) it was very dimly lit. Nevertheless, I kept an open mind. Things didn't get much better once we actually got our tickets and entered the exhibits. The aquarium is laid out in a way that's conducive to walking through it in order, leading you through several large rooms and eventually depositing you back in front. In the first main room we walked into, I was struck by the presence of a large iguana just sitting in an open enclosure, completely within reach of guests, who frequently approached it to pet it. This in and of itself isn't problematic; what was shocking was the lack of an aquarium employee to supervise and ensure the safety both of the animal, and of the guests. In fact, this was a recurring theme throughout the aquarium. I have never once encountered any zoo or aquarium where wildlife is just accessible to guests without any supervision. I was dumbfounded. Another recurring theme was the large piles of uneaten food sitting around the iguana. I should probably mention now that the aquarium actually charges you $3 a pop for food, and you're allowed to essentially feed any animal in there. Animals whose enclosures are wide open, allowing for anything to be thrown in. With no employee supervision. Go ahead and let that sink in for a moment. Ignoring the fact that you're already paying for admission and are then also essentially paying for the animals' food on top of that, they allow guests to handle the food and then feed any of their animals (germs and other health risks notwithstanding). And you pay for it. Even more concerning/shocking is that there doesn't seem to be any limit to what they allow the guests to feed the animals. This was evident in every single enclosure, where there was tons of uneaten food floating in the water and lying on the bottom, resulting in some pretty disgusting environments for the animals. This was particularly noticeable in the ray tank and shark tank. Again, no staff members present at either place, and not only were there piles of uneaten food everywhere in the water, but the wasteful plastic ramekins in which the food is distributed could frequently be found floating in the tanks. The selection of wildlife was at times good (rays, octopus, a large variety of eels), and at times disappointing and puzzling (an overcrowded tank of boring koi, a tortoise, an iguana, tank upon tank of uninteresting fish you'd see at any pet store, parrots(?) and a huge walk-in bird habitat(?), none of which were even seabirds). The tanks themselves were generally disgusting and many were covered in a large layer of dripping condensation, mostly obscuring the occupants. Rather than having signs posted, the aquarium opted to use tablets to display information about the wildlife in each tank. The only issue is that half of them weren't working, leaving one to guess as to what they're looking at. Another issue with the tablets is that so many of the tanks were crammed full of 10+ species of fish, and guests are essentially forced to wait for each species to scroll across the tablet (if it's even working). What a train wreck. This place is a complete bush league profit grab operation, and the lack of cleanliness, staff supervision of the animals and their safety, and just how half-assed the entire thing is, doesn't do anything to dispel that impression. After visiting an aquarium like the Monterey Bay Aquarium or Baltimore Aquarium, this place is just pathetic. It's clear in Monterey, from the moment you enter, that the purpose of the facility is to educate, encourage awareness, and foster excitement in ocean wildlife. This is evident from top to bottom. The Austin Aquarium is the antithesis of this. Spend your money elsewhere. read more

If you have never been to an Aquarium before or have small toddlers that are happy just to see fish, this may be an OK experience for you. If you have been to larger aquariums or want to bring out of town guests, you will be sorely disappointed. The place looks like it was thrown together quickly on a shoestring budget. Not a single tank is taller than my chest, you look down into all the larger ones. Upon entry you can tell it isn't a first class aquarium. You just see a white eight or so foot wall that doesn't reach the ceiling. The bathrooms are the first thing you see upon entry and the cheap doors all have black scuff marks all across the bottom. The area where you pay looks like a second hand booth left over from a carnival. There are really high ceilings, but they don't take advantage of the space by having large tanks or making their faux rocks go all the way up the wall. They didn't pay much attention to detail as the finishes look half done. They used digital photo frames to display information about the fish. A lot of the copy didn't even fit the frame, so you couldn't read it. They had some cool fish, don't get me wrong, but the presentation was not what you would expect from an aquarium. The Employees seemed nice too. I think the Aquariums at a fish store like Fish Gallery or at Cabela's are much nicer. It was pretty expensive for a 45 minute visit. $15.95 for adults and $9.95 for kids. The Houston Aquarium is only $9.99 and Shedd Aquarium in Chicago is only $8.99 for adults. You may have to pay more for shows and other special exhibits, but the price will be pretty much the same for a 1st class aquarium experience. In the end, you get a "aquarium in a strip mall experience". read more

$37.00 for me and my 2 kids to walk through this glorified pet store in 30 minutes. 10 minutes of that was spent at the entrance trying to pay for entry. They have an EXIT door and an ENTRY door, yet they like to have customers who are EXITING purchase their over priced knick knacks at the ENTRY register. So that means you are awkwardly standing in between 2 sets of doors during this entire cluster of confusion. - They had a party going on in which the group took up the entire Aquarium. I could barely maneuver around the crowd with my children and the Aquarium party "host" yelling over his headset microphone was annoying to say the least. - There was some beautiful aquatic life (Stingrays was the fav for my kids). But the price was too high for this lack luster experience. ---- I should have came to Yelp first. read more

We purchased the family membership about a month ago in anticipation of the opening. My family LOVES aquariums and the fact that Austin was getting one... well, awesome. They opened recently to members only, it's still under construction, but we hadn't made it out until last night - which was our Sleepover With the Sharks. What a fabulous experience! I'll talk about both. First, the staff are amazing. Amazing. AMAZING. Our tour guide for the sleepover was Kelly. Kelly loves what she does. She may have told us that, but it was so obvious that she truly enjoys what she does. She gets excited talking about her animals. That's the other thing - every single employee we met obviously considered these animals their own. They take responsibility for their care and love. I think that meant more to me than anything. It's obvious that they care for these animals. They even have names for several of them. Whomever chose the staff should be commended as they've truly gone out of their way to get GOOD people here. The aquarium itself is about the size you would expect for an interactive education based exhibit. If you just want to go look at fish, you need to go to a big aquarium. This is not for you. If you want to interact with, touch some of the animals and really spend time reading the information about them, then you are going to LOVE this place. We learned SO much and saw so many beautiful animals. We were mesmerized by so many of the exhibits. I sincerely believe we could spend several days there still see things we missed. You do NOT want to rush through this place. Take your time and look. Spend time there. It's worth it. I, myself, spent a good twenty minutes just staring at one of the reptiles and how they moved their hands. It's amazing to me that these creatures exist and the ability to see this up close in a nice setting was priceless. Now the sleepover... just do this. Heck, even if I didn't have kids, I would want to do this! It was so awesome! You arrive in the evening after dinner and they get you situated, give you a tour and then another nocturnal tour. You then get to choose where you're going to sleep. We slept near the boat by the jelly fish and it was perfect. We were at the end so my kids sitting up talking quietly didn't disturb anyone and we were close to the bathrooms. The floor is, of course, sealed concrete, so it's hard. We brought blow up mattresses and were quite comfortable. No, you're likely not going to get a lot of sleep. They leave some of the lights on, of course, so bring a sleep mask if you want, but falling asleep while watching these gorgeous fish swim and the listening to the water moving was an exceptionally wonderful experience. One that I will remember always. They wake you up, nicely, around 6am and there's a little breakfast. My ONLY complaint is that they really should have had coffee. Even if someone ran by Krispy Kreme for those big coffee for a crowd and donuts would have been fine, but dude... I needed my coffee. *laughing* I survived, though :) The best part of the sleepover was that you've got a chance to really look at things. We were able to roam around that night and again in the morning while the place was closed. We were able to really spend time looking at them and having a fun little adventure with our family and friends. DO the sleepover. Realize you're not going to get a lot of sleep, you may not be comfortable sleeping on the floor, but who cares? This is not the Ritz. It's an aquarium, enjoy it! We surely did. I've seen others mention that it's a bit dark. It has to be. Remember, these guys are used to deep seas and darkness comes with that. It's not super dark. You're not going to lose a kid or anything. All aquariums we've been at were dark. I do think they could use a little more lighting in the food/play area, but it didn't bother us in the least. The gift shop is large and very open, I hate gift shops that try to jam stuff in and there's no room to move. This was very well laid out and there were plenty of affordable options for my kids to choose a souvenir. The snack bar doesn't have a lot of healthy options, but to be honest, I didn't really look that hard. The playscape next to it pretty big and the group of 10-13 year olds we were with had fun. My daughter fed the birds and LOVED it. Again, the staff shine here. They love these birds, they were there to help the kids experience it, but also protect the animals. Now... the aquarium itself, as I've said is not some huge thing. This is NOT one where you're going to see huge sharks or dolphins or anything. This is a converted furniture store. I love the location, however. It's small enough to that you're not overwhelmed, but large enough to accommodate a good number of animals. The tanks and enclosures are similar in size to what I've seen in other aquariums so I'm sure there was a trade off to get as many interesting animals in the space they have available. A must-do on our list. read more

We arrived and hoped to do the lemurs right away, so stood to wait for about ten minutes only to be told, "the lemurs are getting ready to nap, come back later." No prob, we went ahead to the other exhibits. Problem number 1 arises - One of the kinkajous got away from a handler and was running under tables and ended up in the kitchen area of the snack shack. When I brought it up to one of the employees she laughed and said condescendingly, "oh, that's just how they exercise them and they get in the kitchen all the time." !!!! What??? I'm sorry, isn't this a sanitation concern and health code violation? Ummmm... ok. Moving on. Problem 2 was the condition of some of the animals just looking sadly and a large turtle literally trying to escape his enclosure by any means possible. That just hurt my heart. Problem 3 we heard the sloths were finally there and wanted to meet them. "Only if you pay $60 a person." Say WHAAAAAT???? Um, no thanks! The 4th and final straw occurred when we returned to the lemurs which I had paid $12.99 on top of admission prices for my kids to see... After entering the enclosure, my son literally sat down after waiting for one of the lemurs to move out of the way... another one jumped on him immediately and he had his hands open because he wasn't ready with the 2 finger rule, he was still just getting settled! The guy was like "out" it was seriously 2 seconds after he had sat down. So my son had to watch his other siblings and friends enjoy themselves while he was reprimanded and excluded for something he had no control over. I stated to the employee that I clearly saw what happened and he should at least offer my son a do-over. The employee didn't want to hear it, and said harshly "I told everybody the rules," and they offered no refund. Extremely disappointed. I was done. We will not be returning unless we hear that there have been MAJOR changes and many of our friends are now looking to cancel their memberships. read more