Chowder Bay open day

Last week I received an email from the Australian Museum, telling me that the Sydney Harbour Institute of Marine Science, at Chowder Bay, was going to have an open day today. I'd never heard of SHIMS, or even Chowder Bay, but I thought it could be interesting so we looked it up (it's in Mosman) and went along.

It's part of the Sydney Harbour Federation Trust, located on the waterfront in former Defence land. First we found a nice café where we had lunch, then headed a little further down the road to SHIMS.


On display outside their building was an autonomous underwater vehicle, with carbon fibre propellers that Louka discovered could be made to spin.


Further on we saw a demonstration of how water with different temperatures and salinities can form layers in the ocean.


We looked at sea slugs, sea urchins and other species under microscopes. There were fish, crabs, sea slugs and sea hares in tanks. And there were displays of whale bones, turtle shells, sharks fins and underwater photography.


When we'd seen it all, we wandered round the site, thinking that the beach at Clifton Gardens might be worth a return visit, had a smoothie from the café, then headed off to visit Graham's Nan.