Lofoten Aquarium

From Svolvær we headed to the Lofoten Aquarium. Being outside of the season the place seemed deserted, and we began to doubt that they were even open. Just in case they weren’t we headed up their excellent viewing platform first, it overlooks the seal tank as well as the surrounding bay.

When we headed inside we found the curator, who assured us that the aquarium was indeed open, and was all too happy for us to look around (even giving us a discount).

One notable thing is that the aquarium had a number of ‘Touch pools’ in which sea creatures could actually be handled (without any particular supervision). The inclusion of ‘sea scorpions’ in one such tank did put me off though.

The aquarium had the usual array of sea creatures, from the shimmering and elegant to the tough and ugly. The definite stars of the show were the seals; they glided through their tank with phenomenal speed.

Timing the shots as they swam by the viewing windows was also a bit of a game; quite challenging as the reflections on the glass necessitated manual focusing. (But on the bright side, I managed to get a seal-picture and a self portrait in one thanks to those same reflections).

Whilst we were watching feeding time came around, and (being as the place was so quiet) we were invited to stand with the keeper as he fed them. He told us that some of the seals were 20 years old, meaning that these were the same seals that Nina had seen here as a young girl.Read more