NC Aquarium, Kure Beach, 5k Run

Sunday was a geat all-around day, we started by running in the Friesen Run With the 'Canes 5k race in Raleigh.  It is a 5k race put on by the Carolina Hurricanes NHL team (The equipment manager is Peter Friesen, and when they won the Stanly Cup 5 years ago his day with the cup he organized this race to benefit Leukemia and Lymphoma research and he continues it each year).  During the pre-race ceremonies, the entire team was there getting introduced:

Jim said he realized he's becoming an old man when the players were announced.  He said at first he didn't realize that were the players because they looked too young.  Then it hit him, half the team is between 20-25 years old, or 10-15 years younger than him, so of course they look like they are almost kids to him!

Each race we've been running races, we alternate every other race who pushes the stroller and who runs without it to try and allow each of us to get a good personal times.  This time Colleen ran with the stroller.  Here they are ready for the race

Jim did good, he got 33rd place out of the 500+/- people who ran with timing chips and got 3rd in his age group (males 30-35 years old) out of 22.

After the race, there were a number of events including a double-dutch team.  They invited Colleen to join in and she did great!

Then we drove out to the beach and first visited the NC Aquarium.  There are 3 of them at the coast, we went to the one at Ft Fisher.  It was very neat and we all enjoyed it a lot.

 Avery eyed up an alligator a few inches away

She loved looking at sting rays up close too!

They had a neat 3-story exhibit and while we were there they had scuba divers in there.  2 divers were cleaning the tank and spotting the presenter (from sharks and eels) who had a mic hooked up to the speakers in the public viewing area.  The presenter was giving out great details on all the sea life swimming around her.  Here is one where a young hammerhead shark was swimming near the bottom

 And another were a giant ray was swimming up against the glass showing off its smile:

Here was a giant bull shark, the divers said they keep them well fed so they don't bother them.  We wouldn't want to be in there even with that knowledge!

One of the divers came up to the glass and gave Avery a wave:

Here was a life-size jaw from a now-extinct shark from a few million years ago.  It was crazy to think sharks with jaws this size were swimming around the ocean!

Outside they have a tall pole with levels of the storm surge from previous hurricanes, out of view up above at 18 feet high was Hurricane Hazel in 1954.  Crazy to know that water was that high during that storm, nobody would have a chance to survive that!

After the aquarium we went out to the beach in the town of Kure Beach right up the road, to enjoy the great weather that day.  Avery loved her beach toys, and loved digging with the shovels and mixing water and sand in the buckets

She also loved chasing the gulls and other smaller birds around which was comical!

We also enjoyed a nice picnic and lounging around to relax after the race we'd had that morning

We finished the day by having dinner on the water in Wrightsville Beach, NC at a great restaurant called Bluewater Grill.  We sat on the patio overlooking the boast on the Intercoastal Waterway.

Avery jammed to all the songs the band was playing and cheered and clapped loudly when each song was done!  (We also highly recommend the coconut shrimp if you decide to go there!)

The sunset was beautiful over the water scene.  We drove back to Raleigh after a terrific Sunday!