Redondo Beach: The SEA Lab

I'm not one to kiss and tell or anything, but I'm feeling lucky. Seven years of lucky to be exact.

The secret?

Kissing a sea cucumber. Which I did. For the second time in my life. The first time was on an elementary school field trip to the same place – the SEA Lab in Redondo Beach. Right at the border of Hermosa Beach.

At that time, I remember feeling squeamish because at the time, "boys had cooties" and all that, and we kissed the same sea cucumber. But all in all, I'd say in retrospect those seven years weren't bad, so why not  give my next seven whatever little boost of advantage I can get?

Aside from my favorite fish face above and the sea cucumber, there were even more cool things about taking the SEA Lab tour.

For one, there was Henry, the stingray. (Forgive me in advance if I misname these sea creatures.) It was in one of the touch tanks since he wasn't dangerous and wouldn't actually sting us. I got so excited when he finally came out of the water enough so that I could carefully slide two fingers across the slippery coat.

There were other touch tanks with little crabs, starfish, sea anemone's – even the sharks were touchable (although when one of the male sharks started to get visibly frisky we moved on to the next tank).

Other tanks included the school of mackerel, those fish that lie flat like a pancake in the sand and their eyes move to one side of their face, and the juvenile giant black sea bass which grow to be six feet or larger.

I would highly recommend taking a tour to get more insight and access to the sea creatures, but the inside of the SEA Lab has a nice educational exploration in itself if you just want to stop in.

Also – shoutout to our tour guide who ate some kelp straight from one of the tanks to show it was edible. Well demonstrated. You were awesome in general.

More information about tours, volunteering, parking (bike if you can), or anything else, go here.