belugas just got a museum

Cook Inlet belugas just got their own museum on Turnagain Arm.

The Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center is opening its new Matson Ocean Education Center on May 16. It sits right on the edge of Turnagain Arm at the same spot where folks have always pulled over to watch belugas swim by.

The center features a life-size beluga skeleton, a hydrophone for listening to the ocean below, and big-eye binoculars for spotting whales out in the inlet. Inside there's interactive exhibits on tides, ocean ecosystems, and the Cook Inlet beluga population specifically. There's also an outdoor deck with a clear view down toward Portage Valley.

The whole building is off-grid. Solar panels, rain collection, compostable bathrooms, and the structure itself is built from reused Matson shipping containers. For families driving the Seward Highway with kids, this is now one more reason to actually stop instead of just rolling past.