Sojourn at Seaworld
As intimated in my last blog, Shelly and I journeyed to Florida this last Friday morning, aided and abetted by the inestimable Jason Hawkins, who picked us up and took us to the airport. A hair-raising ride later, to use Shelly’s description, we arrived, checked in, went through security (where I had my shaving cream can confiscated; apparently, spontaneous shaving cream fights between passengers have plagued Southwest in recent years), and boarded our plane. We’d checked in online 21 hours in advance, so naturally we were in the middle of the second sixty-person group to board.
A short 90 minute flight later, we arrived in Orlando, where we disembarked without incident and were hit with our first transportation hurdle- bridging the 12 mile gap to our hotel. We settled on the Mears shuttle, which provided a round trip for two for $58, which sounded high at the time but was probably half of what cab fare would have been. Rental cars were, unfortunately, no where to be found, as the Daytona 500 was occurring on Sunday and all the rental car agencies had sold out weeks in advance. Just to put the moral in front of the story here, this will be the last trip I don’t just rent a car, but I’ll get to all that later.
Arriving at the hotel, we checked in and were driven by golf cart to our room, as the hotel is somewhat sprawling. After unpacking and decompressing, Shelly and I ate lunch at the nearby pool side restaurant, located in the hotel, all the while fending off tiny lizards. No, not really- we saw tiny lizards, but they made no attempt to steal our food. After stuffing ourselves on a delicious lunch, we went back to the room for a minute to relax, making plans to head back to the pool to lay out within minutes. We both laid down- just for a minute, we just needed a minute to rest our eyes…
Two hours later, we woke up to find the sun had set and darkness reigned where once light had held sway. Realizing that these were not ideal circumstances for catching some rays, we decided to take a walk down International Blvd, the street our hotel faced. This street was extremely busy; crossing would have been nearly impossible without the aid of signals. There were shops of every imaginable type and description, from the fabulously ghetto to the verging on ghetto. We treated ourselves to ice cream at one of the many stands, watched several people bungee jump from an incredible tall tower, and, in the highlight of my evening, even got to feed some alligators. Upon hearing the guy’s pitch, Shelly immediately said "No thank you", to which I replied "What? I want to do it!" Shelly snapped a few pictures, which the vendor tried to charge us for, saying his camera was broken but we could use ours for $5 a picture. Fortunately, the spectacle of me feeding gators drew a crowd, distracting the vendor, and we slipped away unnoticed before an incident could take place, as we were NOT paying to use our own camera.
After about two hours of walking, Shelly and I returned to the hotel, very tired. An attempt to visit the hot tub fizzled when we realized we’d literally had to have squeezed in through all the other couples making use of it; neither of us were in the mood to be social.The next morning, we rose bright and early to catch the 8:30 AM shuttle from the Wyndem Hotel to Seaworld. At 9 AM, we went inside to see what the deal was, as the shuttle had yet to appear. Te concierge took care of that for us, and a full-sized bus stopped by several minutes later to retrieve us. Unfortunately, it stopped several other places, going over myriad speed bumps, sending visions of our wretched bus experience in Jamaica dancing in our heads. Fortunately, it only took us about half an hour to reach the gilded gates of Seaworld, which despite my description half a sentence back there, were not actually made of gold.
Once inside, we took in a small breakfast and had a couple of visitors, who had evidently heard we were in town and thought to score a quick meal:
Alas, their gambit paid off, and half of my $6 croissant disappeared into their tiny, slavering bills.Having missed the first dolphin feeding due to the shuttle faux paus, we headed over to see the sting rays, who were splashing playfully along the walls of their large tank, while large, watchful birds stood sentinel on islands in the middle.
Nearby staff were selling small trays of fish to feed the rays, which I immediately decided I had to do.Buying my tray, I came over to Shelly and, unwarily, set my tray on the tank wall. I fed three rays uneventfully, aside from some jubilant splashing- their mouths are on their underside, so you have to hold the fish low in the water, and when they take it from you, it’s a little like a small, powerful vacuum. After my third fish, Shelly asked to try; turning to her, my attention was diverted for a grand total of two seconds. Nearby, one of the large birds noted my lapse and seized the opportunity; flapping over, he scooped up my final two fish in his beak, startling the two of us and the mother and young girl next to us. However, that only lasted a second, and soon we were laughing hysterically at the bird’s chutzpah. Later on, after purchasing two additional trays and dispensing them, we watched something similar happen to a couple of young parents across the tank, who were helping their 2-3 year old son feed the rays. One of the rays swam past and gave them a huge splash, frightening the child and making him cry; the parents turned to comfort him, and immediately a bird flew over and took their fish, this time tray and all. The parents found the whole thing as delightful as we did, though judging by the waterworks, their son wasn’t anywhere near as amused.
Here's a picture of one of those thieving birds, standing unabashedly next to the tank he'd just robbed:
Next, Shelly and I headed over to provide a similar service for the dolphins, although this entailed a good deal more waiting. However, a short time later, we lined up next to their tank, received two trays of fish, and set to feeding them. Here's a picture of my baby feeding them:
Once finished with the dolphin feeding (which, incidentally, was Shelly's favorite part of the day), we took in a show called Blue Horizons, which I will tell you with no reservations was absolutely incredible. A series of about 8 trainers and performers worked with about a half dozen dolphins to do lots of neat tricks, but they also got a small pilot whale (I think that's what it was) in on the action, and also had a handful of parrots that swooped over the audience at certain points of the performance too. It's hard to describe with words and do it justice; all I can really say is to definitely see it if you're ever visiting the park.
Well, that's about the first half of the day; I'll save the second for tomorrow's post. See you then!
posted by Chris @ 8:55 PM
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