Birch Aquarium at Scripps

The aquarium's roots go back to 1903, when the Marine Biological Association of San Diego opened its first small aquarium; that organization later became the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego, and the aquarium grew into its public outreach center. The current 64,157-square-foot building on a hilltop site above La Jolla Shores opened in 1992, funded partly by a donation of 6 million dollars from the Stephen and Mary Birch Foundation.

Inside, more than 175,000 gallons of seawater fill exhibits including a roughly 70,000-gallon kelp forest habitat, hands-on tide pools, and displays of seahorses and leafy and weedy seadragons bred as part of ongoing conservation work. Because the aquarium sits directly above the research institution that supplies much of what it displays, its exhibits tend to connect to real, current ocean science rather than only entertainment, which can make it a rewarding stop for families curious about marine biology.