Toba Aquarium — Attraction in Toba

It’s worth the long train ride from Nagoya. Lots of neat exhibits, with special attention given to the dugong and sea otters. It’s also worth it see the seal/sea lion feeding. Best place to view it is from inside the tunnel on the second floor, as the feeder has the sea lion interact with the tunnel. The balcony on the third floor is pretty good. You can’t see anything from underwater on the first floor though. The one improvement that could be made is for the sea otter exhibit. We could only barely see the otters since there was a massive crowd of people waiting for the feeding time in front of the exhibit an hour before it happened. There was an attendant present but they were only making sure people weren’t waiting on the wheelchair ramp. There should be some sort of system so that people can queue for the otter feeding in an unobtrusive spot, so that other people are able to...

A must visit aquarium for animal lovers. This aquarium houses the most species of marine animals in Japan including rare ones like Dugong & Sea Otters. Been wanting to visit this place for a long time to see the very cute Sea Otters, Mei-chan & Kira-chan. Despite the crowd, I really enjoyed my time here. The live performances were so fun & cute. Loved all the performances from the Penguin Walk, Walrus Touching Time, Sea Lion Show & Feeding time especially for the Sea Otters. Make sure to check the schedule in advance. The most popular area is for the Sea Otters. We queued for about an hour but it was worth it. So happy to finally see them. Enjoyed learning more about new species of animals. They have 1 restaurant here which could get very crowded depending on the time of your visit. Enjoyed the gift shop as well. Would definitely love to revisit this place again. Enjoyed...

Avoid. If you have empathy for animals, it will make you sad to see their condition.

Tourist trap: normal rates are low but charge ¥2100 per person if you are on a cruise, regardless of age. Ordinarily, children should be ¥600 or about $6.

Very sad little aquarium and zoo by western standards; the holding tanks for large marine animals are tiny and the captive animals are clearly driven to sad behaviors like swimming rapidly in circles and even hitting their heads on the glass.

Entering the aquarium is like being teleported back in time 20-30 years when people cared less about animal rights and treated them inhumanely.

There’s seals and walruses trapped in tiny enclosures, usually with several animals per tiny prison cell.

The animals are clearly trapped and unhappy, with what’s tantamount to a life sentence in this awful joke of an aquarium.

100% do...