the great mystery birthday adventure

My niece's kids don't have much. Actually, I think they have less than nothing if that's possible. So I like to spoil them. But I always attach it to something....like a birthday. The twins are 14. I have been taking them places since they were 4. At that time they were living with their grandparents. Their brother just turned 8.

Now since they had structure at my brother's, and they knew what was expected with "aunt, Gayle", they always behaved themselves and our adventures have only increase. Add to that Girl Scouts and lawn care and I have those kids frequently. Their brother, not so much. Each time I tried to take him places something would happen—a meltdown for example.I don't call him the blonde tornado for nothing.  So I rarely take him. Well now he's old enough to figure out the score. And he figure out he was being ripped off.

Last week we went to Lost River Caverns and it went pretty well. So he gave me a list of 5 things he wanted to do for his birthday. After some research I picked the Camden Aquarium. And today was the day.

His mom dropped him off at about 8:15. We went over the rules, grabbed a car bag, the snacks and water, and headed out.

The car bag kept him occupied for the first half of the trip. Then we hit road construction. The child is smart. He not only knew—in detail—what the equipment was, but he could even distinguished brands. Thank you PennDOT for entertaining him. We we on the Schyukill before I heard the first "how much longer".  Like me, he's a chatterbox. While on the Schyukill, I told him there might be times where I need to concentrate on the road and he needed to be quiet. He was. S much that I'm working my way into Penn's Landing and drove past the sign. I said something like, we must have missed the sign. He said "it was 2 or 3 blocks ago. "Why didn't you say something". "You said it was quiet time.

Because of my error, we missed the 10 am ferry. I could have driven to Camden but this was an "adventure",  It needed a boat. We found shade to park in, and spent about 45 minutes walking around Penn's Landing. He took a lot of pictures. I haven't looked at them yet. He killed the battery before the aquarium!

The aquarium was packed. I picked a Tuesday because I thought it would be a slow day. I forgot all about summer camp field trips.  We had to wait 15 minutes to cross the shark bridge. But it was so worth it. I didn't expect the bridge to move so much and be so soft. It's steel. Steel is not soft.

I would give the child a 90% for today. We had a few issues while waiting for the boat. So much so that he wouldn't sit with me on the boat. But by the time we returned to Philly he calmed down. He gave himself a time out.

I messed up coming out of the lot, so I didn't get on the highway. I drove past Independence Hall. He didn't care. But we saw several murals for the first time. The one took my breath away. I wish I could have parked, By the time we hit the art museum he was asleep.

Penn's Landing bathroom: I-3.5