i have been to...monterey bay, long beach, scripps, cincinnati newport aquarium, seaworld cleveland, seaworld SD, georgia aquarium,chicago shedd aquarium, waikiki aquarium, new england boston aquarium, ny aquarium, coex aquarium and the 63 aquarium (seoul, korea), ring of fire (osaka,japan), and kobe suma aquarium (kobe, japan). all i can think of right now...
i also had a chance to go to xel-ha in cancun (
www.xelha.com). its not your standard aquarium, but was unlike anything i had ever been to. you pay a set amount to get into the park and its all you can eat and drink. the park is built around an opening/inlet from the ocean and the fish that are right at the "inlet" are quite big. its basically a big outdoor snorkeling aquarium park. they also have beach chairs throughout the entire park so you can suntan but they also have all these large lizards sun bathing. they come pretty close...i wasnt sure if they were friendly, but i didnt want to take my chances given their size (at least the length of your leg).
of the ones in the US, i think the one i enjoyed the most is the shedd aquarium in chicago. they have an indoor dolphin/beluga tank which is pretty amazing. the dolphin/beluga tank can be viewed from 2 levels, and the second level had lots of tables and chairs where you can just go and chill (even study if you need to). the cincinnati newport aquarium was really well made as well...decent size and a variety of exhibits. im going to have to say that the long beach aquarium is just ok, but then again their outdoor shark/ray touch pool is one of a kind. i did have a chance to check out monterey when they had a great white in the tuna tank. that was definitely something i had never seen before. i was probably the most excited to go to the georgia aquarium, but im going to have to be honest...outside of the main tank, they dont have anything else. the main tank is crazy, but i really felt they could have done much better with setting up other exhibits.
but of all the aquariums i have been to i would have to say the ring of fire in osaka japan (
http://www.kaiyukan.com/language/eng/index.htm) and the one in kobe were the best. the ring of fire had whale sharks way before atlanta had theirs, and the variety they carry along with the presentation of their exhibits are just on a different level. the first time i saw a sunfish in real life was at the ring of fire. the sunfish i saw was at least 6-7 feet tall. not wide, but distance from top fin to bottom fin. the kobe suma aquarium (
http://sumasui.jp/) had a ridiculous piranha exhibit where they would drop huge chunks of meat during feeding times. i have seen them do that in the US, but what i saw in japan was much more carnal. the size of the tanks and the fish they have at the aquariums i have seen in japan are just bigger and better than what i have seen here.
i have not been to the churaumi aquarium in okinawa, japan yet, but that is the one place i still really want to go to. i saw someone post a youtube video of the churaumi aquarium on here before, ill post the link again (
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7deClndzQw).
okinawa is also the home to the underwater pyramids! (
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/09/070919-sunken-city_2.html)
Monterrey Bay
