Petty Harbour Mini Aquarium

Fantastic experience: Had a great time at this sweet little aquarium! The staff were so friendly and knowledgeable and you could truly see their passion come through. Being able to hold some of the marine animals was such a cool experience! I think I had more fun than my 10 year old!

Fantastic experience: What a treat of place to visit!!! It’s a great way to see the local sea life in a close to natural state. The interactive station, where you can hold crabs and starfishes and the like is amazing. The staff make the experience very rewarding. Highly recommend!

Fantastic experience: Absolutely loved it here! Love that they catch and release all animals and use real ocean water in all exhibits. Learned a lot and found the staff very helpful and informative! The touch tank was really cool and loved building our own aquarium (even as adults!). Perfect thing to do on a rainy day around St. John’s.

Fantastic experience: Very good break for youngster. It will busy them for a good 40 minutes. Staff is really friendly

Fantastic experience: We found it by accident really. But decided to go in and we had lovely time. We spent there 45 min admiring crabs, sea urchins, different fish etc. Really worth a visit. Great staff.

Fantastic experience: We enjoyed this gem of a find. The sea life in display are caught at the start of the season and then released back to the ocean at the end of the season or earlier depending on the sea life and its needs. The staff were friendly and engaging, and the touch tanks were a neat way to get closer to the animals. Are was taken to make sure we washed our hands before and after both for our safety and that of the animals. If you’re out Petty Harbour way in the summer, drop in.

Fantastic experience: This place was one of our high lights of our stay in the St John's area. The display animals are caught specifically to display in the aquarium but are release to their home location when they need to be released or the end of the season. The knowledge base of the staff is wide and informative and they were never lost for answers. Great place for kids too. They have touch tanks that are wonderful to experience. A place not to be missed.

Negative experience: Please boycott this establishment. They purport to be “ethical” but allow visitors to take starfish out of water and hold them. This is gross animal abuse for profit, and misinformation is blatantly shared by staff. Starfish lack the ability to breathe out of water, regardless of the time limits set by this company. Some can die within minutes, and any amount of time out of water causes incredible pain and suffering even if we can’t recognise it. It is the equivalent of someone holding your head underwater against your will. In addition the bacteria on human hands can cause infection and disease in starfish. This is not worth getting a “cool photo” for social media clout. Absolutely disgusted that this place is operating the way it is. If you have any respect for marine life, you will boycott it, and call on them to change their cruel animal practices.

Fantastic experience: Nice and educational tours. Learn a lot of the sea creatures. The guides are very knowledgeable. Highly recommended.

Fantastic experience: Did not expect a one room aquarium to enthral our 3 year old (and us!) so much. We thoroughly enjoyed our visit. Also love that everything is released back into the ocean at the end of the season.

Fantastic experience: WOW! Such a fantastic place to explore. Although small, it was packed with good and entertaining tanks, interactive tanks that you can touch and hold things, very knowledgeable and friendly staff, cute little gift shop and a few onsite parking spots. Very fair entry price. You can easily spend 30 - 60 minutes in there.

Fantastic experience: A must-see when visiting Petty Harbour. Staff are passionate about marine life - Warren gave us a private tour and answered all of our questions. We left with a much greater appreciation for what's beneath the waves here in Newfoundland

Fantastic experience: This place has a great conference room called the Carlton Loft, which is an amazing room, with the most amazing Atlanitic Ocean views of crashing waves. What a great venue! 5-stars!

Positive experience: Very small but very interactive and lots of sea creatures. Caught and released at the end of the season, which is great. 10-year-old I took loved it.

Fantastic experience: Great adventure Got to hold a star fish for the first time :)

Fantastic experience: Fantastic little place to visit. The staff is knowledgeable and friendly, and it was awesome to be able to touch the various types of sea life. I learned a lot!!! It’s right on the dock, so we got to see some of the fishermen processing their catch afterwards. Count on at least an hour to explore!

Fantastic experience: Great little place for families. Kids enjoyed the touch tank. Steven was very knowledgable and informative, made it interesting for sure. They take great care of the marine animals.

Positive experience: The conservation and rehabilitation behind this org is a great thing. I really appreciate that they are rescuing sea life and have about a 3-week turnaround before their specimens are released back into the wild, while taking the opportunity to educate vistors. I would say however that this place could really use some renovating or brightening up of their very small space. The tanks are pretty small and covered in condensation so it's hard to see. It also smells a little funky. The touch tank area is particularly fun, and the staff member manning it was incredibly knowledgeable and confident in answering questions. I was able to hold several animals safely under her supervision. Parking was available right off the harbour, and you can enjoy walking around the area, watching the fisherman, getting lost in a flurry of seagulls, and taking some great shots of the boats.

Fantastic experience: Cute for the kids! Kids had a great time. Watch our for seagulls...they aim for you.

Fantastic experience: Very cool little Aquarium! Awesome touch and feel section aswell! They are a seasonal catch and release facility. So all of the species are caught early in the year, studied and brought in to enjoy, and then released into the wild at the end of the season.

Fantastic experience: Such a wonderful stop with very knowledgeable staff! Would recommend if you wanna learn about what's creeping in the depths

Fantastic experience: My kids thoroughly enjoyed their visit and had a lot of fun.

Fantastic experience: Great place to visit. Kid friendly. Lots of parking. Variety of tanks and fish/sea live to view. Touch tank with guide, and a water feature for kids to guide water along a path of pipes are included in the room. In the entrance there are a couple of shelves with items to purchase. We make sure to visit every year! Side note: a fishing boat arrived before we did, and we got to see a tuna being hung and prepared for processing.

Positive experience: This place was great! We thought it was mostly for kids but went anyway because it was raining but we were wrong! They bring in sealife from their Harbour and release it at the end of the season and the tour people who work there were really knowledgeable and spent a lot of time with us explaining everything. It was really fun and worth the small entrance fee.

Positive experience: Great little aquarium. It's an ethical aquarium that is catch and release. So there is a turnover of the marine life. It is literally mini, 1 room with a bunch of tanks featuring marine life located within an hour offshore. There is a touch tank that is great for the kids. Overall if you are in St John's swing by to see the Aquarium and grab ice cream at tinkers afterwards.

Fantastic experience: This place is a gem. It is a small aquarium but staffs try their best to explain about the marine life in each tank. If you like to listen to the stories of the local marine life in the area, this is the really best place to be. They have a touch station that you can touch some marine life ( i think this part is a really kid-friendly). Plus a petty harbor is such a lovely sightseeing stop.

Fantastic experience: Great little place. The staff were incredible and very knowledgeable. It's small but worth every penny because of the staff and the interaction for children. My child loved every minute of it. If you have a chance go see them.

Positive experience: A little smaller than I expected but very knowledgeable and organized.

Fantastic experience: So worth the (short) drive from St. John's. Our family went and thoroughly enjoyed the guided tour. Probably one of our top five vacation activities, as we all learned a lot and got to see a hermit crab try on a shell (home) and try it out, before going back to it's original shell. What a neat experience! Really great staff.

Positive experience: Small but fun for 45minutes. Had the place to ourselves because of COVID-19 which was kind of nice.

Fantastic experience: A seasonal ocean aquarium that has a catch and release policy for their displays, so the ocean life changes from year to year. All local specimens, it is an excellent place to view what is found right off the shores. They have a fun display for kids to play with pipes for the purpose of directing water flow into containers. At the end of the summer season, the locals partake in the safe release of all displays back into the wild.

Fantastic experience: This is a fantastic place to visit with children. You won’t see anything crazy but you will get to touch sea urchins, hermit crabs, starfish. You will see all the local fish up close. Very cool spot that is very fun.

Fantastic experience: Great for the kids and grandparents. They do cater to the young.

Fantastic experience: The kids stayed for ages at the tanks where they were able to touch sea stars, crabs and anemones. Super nice operations! Cozy atmosphere. Will take you 30-60 minutes max but you can of course stay longer.

Positive experience: Delightful place! Great way for kids to see animals in deeper ocean! They sell eco stuff too like steel straws and beeswax wrap....cute gifts.

Fantastic experience: The Petty Harbor Aquarium is a fun location to take kids. It has a number of touch tanks full of many ocean creatures that are safe to touch. Along with many larger tanks full of interesting large ocean life that can be looked at and learned about. They say that all of the creatures are found locally in the ocean, and are returned to the ocean unharmed at the end of the season.

Fantastic experience: This is an amazing place to visit. The staff was absolutely wonderful, they were so friendly and very informative. I would definately urge everyone to visit this wonderful place.

Fantastic experience: Great place for kids (and adults) to learn about our oceans and some of amazing creatures that live there. Loved it!

Positive experience: Small aquarium, but fun for kids. Hands on was the best part! Great knowledge in the Marine staff. Love that it's catch and release based.

Positive experience: Limited parking - majority were parked in the side of the road. Displays were small. Kids enjoyed touching animals.

Fantastic experience: Great place for the kids

Fantastic experience: My son has been a loyal fan since they opened ♡ it's our underwater adventure on dry land lol

Fantastic experience: Fun and informative hands-on experience, great for kids and those young at heart :-)

Fantastic experience: Mini aquarium that believes in conservation through fostering curiosity about local Marine life

Fantastic experience: Interesting aquarium. Great for small kids. Readonale admission price. Only drawback is it's a small place and they can pack a lot of people in.

Positive experience: Not going to lie, one of the most fun bits is squeegeeing off the condensation on the tanks to see the animals! Everyone gets their own squeegee. The animals are mostly caught in the spring and released in the fall, except for the fancy lobsters. It was a neat stop, but I certainly wouldn't anticipate it taking more than an hour to go through.

Positive experience: Honestly didn't expect a lot, and then had a grand old time! Small, but lots to read. Canada Day scavenger hunt was fun!

Fantastic experience: Small but surprisingly fun for small kids. The touch tanks are filled with starfish and hermit crabs. I wasn't expecting much from the look of the place when you walk in the door but we really enjoyed it. Quite small, don't plan to spend much more than half an hour.

Positive experience: A small aquarium that provide a hands on experience with some of the marine life in Nfld. The staff helped get the kids engaged with the touch pools. The setting in Petty Harbour really adds to the character of the aquarium as well. The facility is quite small and gets crowded very quickly. The size of the facility also limits how much time you can spend there - the average visit of 40 min to 1.5hrs on the web site only applies if they are doing a demonstration of some sort during your visit.

Fantastic experience: Our kids and us loved it. They have all local marine animals that you can see and touch. After take a walk in the harbor, very interesting place to see. We arrived in the morning directly from overnight ferry. Summer 2015.