Aquarium Ticketing
Aquariums, Exhibits &
Hotels across America
America runs the deepest aquarium bench on earth — from the cannery-born kelp cathedral on Monterey Bay to the ten-million-gallon hall in Atlanta where whale sharks cruise overhead, with world-class houses in nearly every region: Chicago's Beaux-Arts classic, Baltimore's harbor glass pyramid, Boston's four-story ocean tank, belugas in Connecticut, and the river kingdom in Chattanooga. This guide covers the 28 aquariums and ocean stops worth planning a trip around, pairs them with the right hotel, and maps the road trips that string them together — because an aquarium day is the rare plan that works for every age, in every weather, in every season.
28
Aquariums & Ocean Stops
15
Hotels
6
Travel Guides
10M
Gallons at the Biggest
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Attractions & Tours
Top Aquarium Experiences
Monterey Bay Aquarium
America's #1, and it isn't close — the aquarium that invented the living kelp forest, raised the bar for every institution after it, and still runs the country's best single exhibit lineup: otters, open-ocean tuna, and deep-sea aliens.
Georgia Aquarium
The biggest in America — ten million gallons in downtown Atlanta, and the only place outside Asia to swim beneath whale sharks: four of them, cruising a football-field tank past a 61-foot viewing window and a 100-foot tunnel.
Shedd Aquarium
The grand old master — Chicago's 1930 Beaux-Arts temple on the lakefront, where belugas and dolphins perform against skyline windows, a Caribbean reef spins in the marble rotunda, and the architecture is half the ticket.
National Aquarium
Baltimore's glass-pyramid icon — the Inner Harbor landmark that ascends through a dripping tropical rainforest to ring-shaped shark and ray tanks, with an Australian river gorge, dolphins, and the best one-way flow design in the field.
New York Aquarium
The city's aquarium on the Coney Island boardwalk — founded in 1896, rebuilt after Hurricane Sandy around Ocean Wonders: Sharks!, with sea otters, sea lions and penguins on the open-air Sea Cliffs and the Atlantic a few steps away.
Sant Ocean Hall, Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History
The best free ocean experience in America — a full-size North Atlantic right whale overhead, a giant squid, megalodon jaws and a living coral reef tank, on the National Mall with no ticket required.
Hotels
Where to Stay in Aquarium
InterContinental the Clement Monterey
★★★★★
Sleep across the street from America's #1 — the contemporary Cannery Row flagship facing the Monterey Bay Aquarium's entrance, with oceanfront balconies over the kelp and rope-drop access measured in footsteps.
Four Seasons Hotel New Orleans
★★★★★
The aquarium's literal next-door neighbor — New Orleans' five-star in the riverfront trade-tower, with Mississippi-view rooms, the observation deck upstairs, a resort pool over the levee, and the Quarter beginning at the corner.
Boston Marriott Long Wharf
★★★★★
Sleep next door to the New England Aquarium — a harbor-front hotel on Long Wharf with water views, an indoor pool over the harbor, and Faneuil Hall and the North End a short walk away.
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