Academy of Sciences

Can you believe my camera ate some of my pictures up? So instead of giving you the pictures straight, I have to deceive and reorder them to make a more coherent picture story of my adventures at the Academy of Sciences super grand reopening.
















This is the "living roof" A roof with plants all over it. It absorbs something like 22 million gallons of rain every year which is good for run off and other eco things. It also looks cool.
















Just entering the building, there is an atrium in the middle. Oh I forgot to mention that being day 1, it was free. And being day 1 there was a FOUR HOUR wait to get in. There were groups of 4000 let in at a time and I was in group 5. I originally wasn't going to wait but I thought I'd see if the line would end up moving briskly (it obviously didn't) but ended up talking with a fellow from Austria so at some point it became "well I've waited this long..."
















So when I came in, there were people filling the entire space between where you see that mini-crowd by the door and that mass of people in the back. Madness.





















Above is the awesome digital planetarium. Below is the Filipino Coral Reef.
















There is the dinosaur! Hard to believe it was alive just 4000 years ago!
















Back side of atrium.





















Rain forest super dome?
















Below the Rain forest is people!





















From below





















From the middle.
















Above on the gangway.
















There are butterflies, moths, and birds freely flying around in here.





















!!! King of Cockroach!





















Full vertical stretch
















When you get to the top of the rain forest, there is an elevator that takes you down into the aquarium. Only when I got to the top, one of the elevators decided to have a "problem" and there was a big backup. Keep in mind this is a rain forest with climate control. Thankfully it wasn't too hot but the humidity was sort of a wimpy version of Singapore atmospheric training.
















Now I am people below. See the people above.
















Albino Alligator.
















Big Ass Snapping Turtle
















Aquarium
















Tanks
















Jelly
















Fish





















Giant Sea Carrot!
















Giant Enemy Crab!
















Anemenemenee
















Bio-luminescent coral.
















Coral plate
















Big ass tortoises
















Pendulum clock
















Venus fly traps. They also had some pitcher plants and those honeydew plants that digest bugs with sticky tendrils. Funny how small they all look but on TV they make them appear so big but to the bugs, they are.
















Failed animal rescues turn into taxidermy!
















Shiny
















Bugs
















In the cool planetarium. Unfortunately there were some technical gliches as one of the six synced projectors kept becoming unsynced breaking the illusion of total awesomeness. That and having woken up early combined with Sigorny Weaver's narration put me to sleep once we got into space.





















Lots of statues in GG Park.





















Deyoung Museum across the concourse. The roof is also lined with a bunch of solar cells.