Dawn on Thursday, April 9, 2026

It was windy and the wind created big waves out in the ocean. In the early morning, Eric drove over to the beach to watch the big waves. It also rained on and off all day – sometimes it rained hard for a few minutes and stopped, sometimes there were a few big scattered drops now and then, sometimes just drizzle. The humidity made the air temperature hot, but the wind was cold, so it made the temperature fluctuate in a weird way.

A Yacht Tech employee came out this morning and worked on the water maker. He changed the oil and salinity sensor. Eric had been unable to change the sensor himself because of the odd wrench size. The technician had actually made his own specialty wrench by altering another wrench. Having the right tool for the job did the trick. This was another project that Eric hated to pay someone else to do, but he knew that he would risk hurting his back again if he tried to do it himself.

In the early afternoon, Christi and Keith headed down to Ft. Lauderdale to see Tiki Tour. They were still in Ft. Lauderdale, but had moved locations. This time, the drive was uneventful, but the Maps app routed us through the airport, which was weird. Christi and Keith picked up Fynn and the three of them went to the Museum of Discovery and Science in downtown Ft. Lauderdale.

There was a parking garage across the street that was free, but it did have a toll booth and arms blocking the entrance/exit, so our guess was that, like in Norfolk, they probably charged for parking when there were special events. We weren’t sure what to expect, but as soon as we walked into the outdoor foyer area, it was clear it was a children’s museum.

The was a giant gravity clock. On the top track, a ball was released every minute. The 10th ball made all the previous 9 balls fall onto another track. On that track, the balls were release every 10-minutes the 6th ball caused the previous five balls to drop onto the third track, which could hold up to 12 balls and released one ball per hour. One knew the time by counting the balls on each track. At 1:00 (am & pm), the balls all reset themselves and the sequence begins again.

By the time we’d bought tickets, it was almost 1500. An IMAX film was included in the admission price, so we opted for the last one of the day, at 1600. The boys wanted to start with the airplanes/flight exhibit, so we headed upstairs. It was a big exhibit with a lot of very cool interactive machines that helped kids understand difficult to grasp concepts, such as air pressure and force. However, the majority of the machines were broken. But Keith and Fynn had a lot of fun with the few that worked.

This one showed how much force was needed to overcome gravity.

They put scarves in these vacuum tubes. The scarves were sucked up and released from the ceiling.

There were several different types of flight simulators, and all of them were broken.

We moved on to the exhibit on ancient history and minerals. It was small and geared towards younger children, but it was surprisingly informative. Prior to the last ice age, what is now Florida was almost completely underwater. During the ice age, sea levels lowered, and Florida not only emerged from the water, it was twice as wide as it was now. When the ice age ended, the sea levels stabilized where they are now. Florida’s unusual geological history meant there were some unusual artifacts. There were a couple of exhibits on ammonites, which were an extinct group of marine animals that evolved 400-million years ago and died out 65-million years ago due to a cataclysmic event. Interestingly, they were named after the Egyptian god Ammon, which was depicted with rams horns that kind of resemble the shape of the ammonites.

There was a display on sharks and the various species that eventually evolved into sharks. Shark teeth were the most commonly found fossil in Florida, and Venice, Florida was the shark tooth capital of the world. And there were a couple displays on dinosaurs. In 2005, a paleontologist found a couple of dinosaur eggs with full shells inside a theropod, which supported the belief that birds evolved from dinosaurs. We found out that herbivores laid round eggs and carnivores laid long, skinny eggs. Eggs ranged in size from lemons to (American) footballs.

There were a surprising number and variety of minerals on display. Here was one of several displays.

The other two exhibits on the second floor were on the human body and hockey. Since we were limited on time, the boys skipped those and went downstairs. By far, the biggest exhibit downstairs were assorted living small creatures, such as fish, amphibians and reptiles. Most were in relatively small cages/tanks. Interestingly, the snake pictured below was a Burmese Python, an invasive species that Florida is trying to eradicate.

The biggest animal area was the otter tank, which was full of beautiful fish. We watched the tank for a few minutes and enjoyed the fish, but we never saw an otter.

Not far from the otter area was an area on the prehistoric animals of Florida, which included… to be continued…