Posing at the Sydney Aquarium with Bruce, from Finding Nemo.

LINKS: As you might have gathered from that whole "fish enthusiast" thing, I am exactly the sort of person who keeps a list of every aquarium they've ever visited. Here they all are, with notes, as well as links to friends, fellow writers, and journalistic places where I've toiled.

Since you're here, maybe you wonder what the most extreme aquarium I've ever been to is. (Why thank you!) It is, without a doubt, the Quistococha Zoo in Iquitos, Peru. Iquitos is on the Amazon, a long day's boat trip from the Brazilian and Colombian border, and calls itself the world's largest city without a road connection to the rest of the world. I had a day before my trip downriver to the border, so I went to the zoo. And I was strolling along next to what looked like a murky koi pond when suddenly I had the sensation that a banyan tree was surfacing by my feet. It was a paiche, one of the world's largest freshwater fishes, and I'm not sure when I've ever been more impressed.

Friends/Romans/Countrymen (Not Fish)

• The Daily Nexus
  

  As they say, a high-quality paper on low-quality paper.

• UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism
  

  Got my master's here. Neat place.

• Brendan Buhler
  

  The best writer in America happens to be a friend.

• Wide Aperture
  

  Feel smarter, just by reading the work of Josh Braun, world's nicest human.

• Alec Nevala-Lee
  

  The first and possibly best editor I ever had blogs here about writing.

• Jon Carroll's "Red Horses in Ireland"
  

  My favorite column ever, by San Francisco Chronicle columnist Jon Carroll.

• Russ Rymer
  

  The home page of science writer Russ Rymer, one of my journalism school mentors.

• Kazuhiro Kibuishi
  

  Kazu's the most talented artist I've ever met. Great online comics and books.

• Aldea Yanapay
  

  The home page of my Peruvian host brother's day care center.

Aquariums/Fish Experts/Predators (Fish)

• The Love Lab
  

  Milton Love: Professor, author, marine biologist, fish tattoo expert.

• Apex Predators (dot-com!)
  

  With a name like that, you can't go wrong. Borderline genius shark photography.

• Monterey Bay Aquarium (Monterey)
  

  The best on the West Coast, maybe the best in the world. Great white sharks!

• California Academy of Sciences/Steinhart Aquarium (San Francisco)
  

  Whoa. This place has gone crazy cool with its redesign. Huge living coral reef.

• Birch Aquarium at Scripps (San Diego)
  

  Cute little aquarium in La Jolla, with a great view of the cove and pier.

• SeaWorld (San Diego)
  

  They pioneered the performing marine mammal thing. Meh.

• Audubon Aquarium of the Americas (New Orleans)
  

  I visited pre-Katrina, but it was amazing. Piranhas!

• Musee Oceanographique (Monaco)
  

  An astonishingly stylish, beautiful aquarium in Monaco. (Page is in French.)

• Donostiako Aquarium (San Sebastian, Spain)
  

  Small, but worth a visit if you happen to be in Northern Spain. (Page is in Spanish.)

• Sydney Aquarium (Sydney, Australia)
  

  Antiquated layout, but the shark tank/tunnel here is very good.

• Acuario Ushuaia (Ushuaia, Argentina)
  

  Very small, but has some truly, truly enormous trout.

• Quistococha Zoo (Iquitos, Peru)
  

  Not quite an aquarium, per se, but makes up for it with giant Amazonian fish.