A Traveler's Tourist Plight: Virginia Beach, Day 3

The future belongs to crowds. --Don DeLillo

Youth doesn't need friends - it only needs crowds. -- 

Zelda Fitzgerald

So I woke up to what was, weather-wise, the most beautiful part of the day today: about a half hour just past sunrise. While yesterday's weather was sunny and warmish, but windy, a cooler weather system blew in over night... making today, according to my daughter, a "hoodie day."


My Dear Sweet Ma just said it was cold.  To be fair, though, anything under 70 degrees is cooler than she'd like the temperature to be.

After all of us were awake, we went out to breakfast and discussed our plans for the day. We were close to both the Virginia Aquarium and Marine Science Center, and the Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art. The Kid expressed a lack of interest in Contemporary Art, and said that she hadn't been to the Aquarium in long time. And so we decided on the Aquarium.

Aquariums and zoos have long struck me as odd. In the best of of them, you go and see critters in unnatural environments meant to enhance the experience of the humans poking fingers into the cages rather than improve the life of the fish and animals -- some of which were captured, some of which were born in captivity. In the worst of them, it's a dominionist's dream, designed to show the pre-ordained ascendancy of Mankind above all other critters. That most zoos and aquariums have embraced a more educational identity -- or that some try and save endangered species -- doesn't change the fact that it's always very clear which monkey is on the inside of the of the cage and which is on the outside.

Getting there took some doing. Even though between us we had three different GPS driven directional devices, a far more gravitational power held sway. Two people (My Dear Sweet Ma and me) who

1. Suffer from a tragic lack of any sense of direction, and
2. Don't really know their way around to begin with

can counteract the best GPS in the world by a degree of 1000 to the 10th power. It's as sure as a drought in the desert. As predictable as Tiger Woods nailing a bombshell blonde. As real as the fact that the city of Norfolk, Virginia was originally built on a swamp that itself must have been cursed. (Sorry. Curse-ed.)

We used the map function on my phone to find directions. It seemed easy enough. The directions took us back onto I-264, which I figured was just a way to circumvent stoplight traffic on Virginia Beach Blvd. Not to mention the fact that Virginia Beach Blvd is a long and windy street, much like Vine Street in Cincinnati. It made sense. And we had unshakable geographical certainties on our side. The Atlantic was to the east. We couldn't go too far without driving into the ocean. At some point if we drove to far west, we'd have to go through a tunnel and drive into Norfolk. 

That and turn by turn directions should have been enough; which means, of course they weren't.

We ended up doing a big circle and coming back around to the hotel... at which point we decided to go back upstairs and figure out just where in the hell we were going... during which time the Kid decided to take a nap.

Later, when we finally made ti to the aquarium -- it was only 2 MILES away from the hotel -- it became obvious very quickly that we were not the only ones to think of going to there. Vultures* were preying on potentially soon to be empty parking spots. There was a line just to get in. And once inside, there was an even longer line to get to one of the 5 or 6 overworked and over-stressed Admissions workers. There were people everywhere.

Once we had our tickets, though, we decided to go through and see the exhibits. And I was still reasonable optimistic. Maybe I'd get to see some cool fish.

All I managed to see was the Exhibit of People. It was beyond capacity crowded, mostly with people troweling in groups, mostly with small children, at least half of whom had no interest in anything at the Aquarium. But people stood in front of the displays and tanks, pointing and snapping pictures -- of the critter(s) in question and making the kids sit, stand, or kneel in front of the display or tank to take the prerequisite family vacation photo that will be posted on Facebook to prove to everyone that a good time really was had by all. 

I don't like crowds. I do like people watching... but that's not the same thing. Crowds make it hard for me to breathe and to move. I come by this honestly. My Dear Sweet Ma is exactly the same way... and while my daughter isn't really that way -- she generally can find better things to than have to listen to the inevitably present cadre of crying babies.

It was all we could do to get through the crowd and back out again. I still couldn't tell you anything I saw because I didn't really see anything. Once out, we had to go wait in line for an IMAX movie... which, had we seen it, would have been as close to anything fish related I had seen that didn't include my previous night's dinner. But it became abundantly clear very quickly that none of the three of us had any interest in waiting in another crowded line.

So we left and drove straight for Murphy's Irish Pub -- a not too bad looking place, though priced for the tourist trade. They did have Guinness on tap, though. And Maker's Mark on the shelf.

The day became instantly much improved.

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*vultures: those drivers in crowded parking lots that sit and wait for you to pull out of a spot rather than driving around and seeing if there's one not being used. These are the same sort of people who go to funerals in order to make sure the guest of honor is dead and not simply trying to get out of paying taxes.