Day 08: Seaworld

Our second week, on the home stretch now which is a little sad to think about but we’ve still got a full week packed with parks we haven’t seen yet (and also some we have), plus the 4th July celebrations on Thursday too :) Weather not so great today and we’ve been warned that Seaworld will close rides in bad weather but its not as far away as Legoland was so we took the risk. Turned out to be the worst day of weather yet! :) However it didn’t affect us in the slightest unlike yesterday - we had a great day and there was plenty to do and see (and we remembered our waterproofs this time, which helped). So first up is the Dolphin show. I wasn’t too fussed about Seaworld to be honest, but just seeing this show changed all that. I think Douglas Adams was right when he said Dolphins were the second smartest creatures in the world. They did everything, pushed, pulled, jumped, twirled and splashed all to have a few thousand humans sit watching them, with jaws open shouting ooh and ahh… yeah definitely smarter than us ;) The show was excellent and everyone loved it - 9 out of 10 dolphins (surely by now this is self evident).

Daddy: So did you like the dolphins Gracie?

Grace: Yeah, but what happened to the little fishes?

Daddy: Oh that’s their food baby :)

Shamu, the cute little KILLER WHALE!

So straight after the dolphin show, we quickly made our way over to the other side of the park and into Shamu’s stadium, to catch the main Shamu show. This is the one Ann wanted to see more than anything so she headed up our vanguard throwing people aside with reckless abandon as we sped through the crowds (ok maybe not that bad but she was really excited). The show was more of the same really, with a number of orca’s doing all sort of neat tricks & jumps and splashing and spraying the (un)suspecting audience with huge (and I mean HUGE) waves. We managed to see most of the show before they stopped it due to the weather which was now bucketing it down outside. Patrick was a little concerned for the killer whales but I told him that they probably liked the rain (well its wet, aint it?). 9/10 dolphins too.

And the rain continued for the next few hours. We had waterproof jackets, so we walked around the park without letting it affect us (it still was pretty warm, and it was nice to alternative the the sticky humid weather which we had with us the last few days).

We came across the Sharks next, which included a pool with a number of different sharks all swimming about. And you could actually feed them (horrible smelling fish guts as it turns out), which was really fun - though I think they were stuffed as they didn’t seem to bother too much about our food when we dropped it in (as opposed to the vision I had in my head when you would just see a frenzy of teeth, blood bubbles akin to something out of Jaws). We also went through an underwater tunnel and seen a variety of sharks and other fish swimming about which was really fascinating (I really dig that kind of thing and would give it a 8/10 ranking as an attraction).

(The kids in the jaws of a great white display)

They also had a restaurant there and although we didn’t dine, I just popped my head in the door to see what it was like. At that point a wave of panic set in and I felt the blood drain quickly from my head. What I seen was a typical place where you would have a fine meal but the back wall was a large expanse of glass, with the water thick and dark and hundreds of large fish and sharks popping in and out of view. Not really anything to be frightened of normally but this just happened to match EXACTLY a particularly vivid set of a recurring dreams I had a good few months back. It was like an intense feeling of deja vu (though it wasn’t really as I had actually dreamed it) and it took me a minute or so to recover from it. A memory from when I was there as a kid perhaps? Not that I remember it (though probably as Occam’s Razor would dictate), but it was all very chilling in any case and not an experience Ill forget any time soon.

Anyway…

Antarctica!

A new area and attraction in the centre of the park, kitted out like a snowy cavern, complete with glacial walls and rock formations. We queued for the star attraction - Empire Of The Penguin. This trackless ride followed the adventures of a little penguin by the name of Puck and promised to be different every time. With any new ride, this had a long wait time (90 minutes from when we queued), but due to the bad weather it seemed a few folk had been put off and decided to call it a day, so didnt have to wait that long. It was an exciting ride, showing of the various stages of Pucks development, which as rides go was quite good (the trackless thing was a little weird as it was like our car had a mind of its own). It then popped us out at the live penguin exhibit which was the really cool part but it was BLOODY FREEZING (and with it being rainy outside we were all still pretty much wet which made it worse). 8/10.

Faster, faster!

We had seen enough of the park and though we missed out on a few other attractions (we had arrived in the afternoon) we felt we had done enough of the park to warrant it a success. There was however one ride that I fancied doing prior to exiting, which was the The Manta! This head first, face down inverted coaster zipped and twisted across the park and even had you dipping your feet into a pool of water. It looked really good but height restrictions meant no kids so only me and Ann went on (and again due to the weather there was hardly any wait - bonus). It was amazing and it was the first substantial thrill ride Id been on since we got here. 10/10.

There were a few other attractions including some sting rays which we breezed past on our way to the exit (still raining more or less at that point), but everyone agreed that was a great day (even if it was only a few hours) and a great improvement over yesterdays outing.

One last thing, unrelated to today’s events, but there are a hell of a number of Scottish people on holiday here. It seems that every bus ride, restaurant or park ride we’re queueing for - there’s always some sort of Scottish accent that’s not too far away. Here’s a great example… so having dinner tonight and queueing to get Patrick some ice cream and I say to him that we just need to wait our turn (because he is rather an impatient child sometimes, especially when it comes to food). Then this little girl who was standing next to us, (who was about 12-14), turned to me and said, as cool as a cucumber and in a thick Glaswegian accent: ‘Aye, its murder int it?’ LOL :)

Ok to bed, we have a water park which were going to make an earlier start on tomorrow but the weather forecast is still looking bleak. Ah well, happy days! :)