“Oh wow!” I said, impressed by the sweep of the Inner Harbor and the clean lines of the Baltimore Aquarium. “I can’t believe you’ve never been here before,” said one of the children.
“We’ve all been here lots of times!”
“With Daddy.”
“Also with friends.”
“And school trips, remember?”
“Oh wow,” I repeated faintly a few minutes later, having had my wallet practically vacuumed to pay for parking and admission fees. I reeled away from the ticket booth and got a sympathetic smile from a woman in line.
“First time, eh,” she said. It wasn’t a question.
“Just so you know, guys, we’re not going to the gift shop,” I announced in a fun, pre-emptive way.
“See?” the woman said gratefully to her own children. “Those kids aren’t going to the gift shop either!”
We fended off another expense at the aquarium door — “Sure you don’t want a photo of yourself with the kids?” — before making our way upstairs via escalators that deposited us right beside … a gift shop.
“A T-shirt with a jellyfish on it!” cried one of my daughters.
“A sparkly mermaid!” cried another.
“No way!” cried I.
“On to the sharks!” cried my son.
For a rookie visitor, I have to say, it was a real treat. I gawped at everything: The three-flippered sea turtle and snaggletoothed sharks and red-limbed octopus, of course, but also striped bass and hermit crabs and a pretty pair of scarlet ibises in the rainforest exhibit.
My veteran entourage was kind enough not to hustle me past the less dramatic dioramas. Actually, we couldn’t have hurried if we’d tried; the place was absolutely jammed with vacationing families.
Nor was I the only newbie, it seemed. At one point, a commotion broke out behind us at the base of an angled moving walkway that takes visitors up one level, across a pool of swimming creatures. With the crowd surging around her, an older woman in a sari was resisting her family’s efforts to shove her on to the metal ramp. She objected loudly. They insisted. Other visitors kept pressing forward. A moment later the crowd broke around her, and I could see the struggle continuing as other patrons surged past the family to get on the walkway.
At the top floor, we paused to take in a view of the harbor.
“They have lemonade here,” one of the children remarked suggestively.
“Never,” said the cheeseparer.
“Water, at least?”
“Oh very well.”
There went another large bill, but it couldn’t be helped. Off we strolled with our drinks to see jellyfish, lionfish, arrow fish and any number of other interesting creatures. The sting of the day’s cost was beginning to fade.
A friend of mine has a special technique for dealing with such pricey family excursions. Before she leaves home, she visualizes all the expenses she’s bound to encounter — entry tickets, gas, lunch, bottled water, the dreaded gift shop — and, in her head, doubles their price. By taking the psychological blow early, and exaggerating it, she always comes home with the pleasant illusion of having saved money.
Next time we visit National Aquarium in Baltimore, I plan to do the same.
Meghan Cox Gurdon’s column appears on Sunday and Thursday. She can be contacted at [email protected].
