Deno's Wonder Wheel at Coney Island

Mikro has been on the Wonder Wheel before, but only in the white stationary cars. This time, he was ready to give the swinging cars a try. As the massive ferris wheel turns, gravity causes the blue and red cars slide along a groove and drop, which sets them swinging. Mikro screamed the whole time, but said he had fun...




Here you can see the grooves that the car slides in (click t make bigger):



The view is incredible:





Next stop: The arcade, and Deno's kiddie park.

Beach & Boardwalk at Coney Island

Wading and beach combing on Coney Island Beach, one of the best things about growing up in Brooklyn, or having a mom who did!





In the days following Hurricane Irene, I'm sure some interesting treasures washed up on the sand. Here are some cool things we found:



And coolest of all was a pair of mermaid's purses (egg cases from sharks, rays and skates). If you look closely, you can make out one in the upper left of Mikro's collecting bag:



We watched the sunset, and wandered the boardwalk, where we came upon an exotic animal handler, who let Mikro pose with his animals:





Then it was time to ride the Wonder Wheel...

NY Aquarium: Penguins, Jellyfish and More

I had promised Mikro that we would find a fair weather day to revisit Coney Island this summer, and we did. Although the day started off with a disappointment (Mikro is not quite tall enough to ride the Cyclone yet...), it was a lot of fun.



We started off at the Boardwalk, and had some lunch.



Then we headed back to the aquarium, to see some things we missed last time, and revisit some old favorites... Mikro was especially interested in the Alien Stingers exhibit. We studied cnidarians earlier in the year, and it was fun to see then outside the pages of a book.






We watched the peguin and piniped feedings:









And we wandered the rest of the exhibits.





Then it was time to go to the beach...