Amanda's Trip of Firsts - September 19, 2005 Sea World (Long) About This Page:

[Wild4Diz]

Link to September 18, 2005 My Journey and Pop Century

September 19, 2005 Plans
Sea World - Ride the rides and see the shows until 2:30pm
Check-in for the Beluga Interactive Program at 4:30pm
*This will be the first time swimming with Beluga Whales. I’ve been to Discovery Cove and I loved that, but this will be something even more unique!

The Reality
The alarm rang at 6:45am this morning. Ouch – oh no I have a horrible sore throat…No, I can’t be sick…No, I feel fine, must be allergies or some sort. Whew – I’ve dodged the sick bullet, but my throat does still hurt. After contemplating my throat for a while I decided that I should get up and get moving.

I got up at 7:05am and got dressed. I took my time since I knew that Sea World didn’t open until 9:00am. I finally headed out at 8:00am and went in search of my car. Okay, it seems to be pretty nice out this morning. So far, not to humid, not to hot – good I can live with this. I found my car nice and easy, guess my parking spot wasn’t so bad after all. Wet windows – so strange – don’t have to worry about those in Phoenix very often.

I have no directions to Sea World. I always get lost in Orlando. This should be fun! This morning was no exception – I took the very scenic route this morning. At least now I think I could find a couple of Targets, Walmart and Kmart if I needed one. Finally I got myself back on track and made it to Sea World at 9:00am just as the National Anthem was finishing up.


The Sea World entrance – bad picture, but the only one I took of the entrance this time

I purchased my ticket online before I left home so I went through bag check and in to the park without any problems at all. I went over to the Information Center and checked to see what I had to do to check in for the Beluga Interaction Program. I checked in right there and then I was told to be at the statue of the polar bears outside Wild Arctic by 4:00pm and that’s where the program would start. Okay, I’m all set – now it’s time to see the park.

I’ve been to Sea World many times so there isn’t anything that I feel I have to do, but I want to see Blue Horizons since it’s new and I also want to see Odyssea so I’ll try to hit these two shows other than that I don’t plan on any shows.

First up are the stingrays. I love the stingrays – I fell in love with them on my first Sea World Orlando visit back in 1991. They are amazing and quite odd – to me they represent aliens that live in the sea. They feel like rubber, but squishier. I didn’t bother feeding them today, just petted them as they went by. If you put your hands in the water and are relatively still they’ll actually come up and brush against your hand. There are a lot of them and they were very active. I enjoyed just watching them, petting them and watching others that had never felt them before.


A good sized ray

I went and saw the turtles – while I think turtles are very cool, I don’t think they are very exciting to watch. I took a couple of pictures and moved on.


Two turtles just chillin’ in the water

I headed over to Dolphin Encounter. I adore dolphins and I’m not one that tries to get them to come to me unless they want to. Today it was more about taking pictures and just enjoying them. I did get to touch a couple of them so that was kind of cool. I didn’t see anyone misbehaving so that was good – they also had a ton of staff out among the visitors and they were actively instructing people what to do. The area is large enough that the dolphins can get away from the people if they want to. I had fun watching one dolphin that was having a good time pushing the staff member in the canoe – it was pretty humorous as the staff member would be paddling along and then this dolphin would get behind the boat and push it in one direction or another – and it seemed that the direction was usually not the direction the staff member was trying to go. I spent quite a bit of time here, but after a while I decided to move on.


Up close and personal with a dolphin

Another dolphin shot

I wonder what the dolphins really think when they look at us

People enjoying the dolphins

Next I wandered over to the manatees. I love manatees – okay so I love most of the sea life and if I don’t love it I respect it immensely. When I reached the manatees they were being fed. This was something that I hadn’t watched here at Sea World. How cool – they were tossing whole heads of lettuce in to the water and the manatees were having a grand time munching away.


Hey, that’s my lettuce

MMM….Lettuce

Cute manatee topiary

I walked over to the Penguins so I could check them out. Hey, what’s up it doesn’t smell as bad as it usually does or maybe I’m stuffed up and just can’t smell it…I like watching the penguins so I decided to walk up above instead of taking the moving sidewalk. While watching them a man came up and asked me to take his picture – at least I think that’s what he was saying because he didn’t speak English. I took two pictures for him and he moved on. It was kind of funny as he knew enough English to say ‘Hey Lady’ and that was about it the rest was just charades. After that I just watched the penguins swim and stand, stand and swim and then I headed out.


Who are you looking at?

Okay everyone - wings out

Shark, shark - Everyone out of the water – shark, shark! Man those sharks are menacing looking and they have so many teeth. I watch them swim right over my head and I know what they do is instinct and all, but I can’t help but think that they just look evil and calculating. I was just too fascinated to take any pictures and the moving sidewalk really does go to fast for me here – I could spend a lot longer watching the sharks swim overhead.

I headed over to Clydesdale Hamlet to take a look at the big horses. Oh, they are so beautiful. This morning they are all munching away on their hay. I did see a new addition and that’s the Budweiser Donkey. Oh he was so cute and little – I don’t even think he was as big as my Black Lab. None of my pictures turned out very good here so I won’t make you try to decipher what you’re looking at.

Wild Arctic was my next stop. I was first in line to head in to the ride. There was literally no one there – it was so quiet. Oh no, the ride is broken…I wasn’t very disappointed as I’ve done this a ton of times and it really isn’t that great. There were a few other people that showed up and we all received a pass to come back later and get right on the ride. I doubted that I would actually use it.

It turned in to a walking tour, which was fine by me. I spent some time looking at the Polar Bears. There was a male and a female out today and they were both stretched out and ready to sleep. This was the first time I’ve had a good view of them – usually they seem to be hidden away when I go through there. I spoke to the staff member there and she told me that the male weighs 1500 pounds and the female weighs 500 pounds. Their paws are huge – the male was sprawled out and stretched one of his paws and I was amazed at how large it really was. Next up were the walruses – I was told their names are Dozer and Garfield. Man Garfield is huge and they were both just swimming around and very active this morning. I did walk by the Beluga Whales before seeing the walrus, but more on them later.

By the time I headed out of Wild Arctic it was 11:00am and I decided that I should try to get some lunch soon. I headed to the Sea Fire Inn and I had coconut shrimp with fries, lemonade and bottled water for $17. It was good – I wouldn’t call it outstanding but I didn’t feel like I paid too much either.

My stomach was full and I decided it might be a good time to see a show so I headed towards the Nautilus Theatre to see Odyssea. It was getting pretty hot and the humidity was high so I sat on a ledge at the Odyssea line in the shade and just reviewed some of my pictures and tried to cool off a bit. Thank goodness for my little keychain fan – it really did help and I used it while I waited. Shortly after I sat down a woman came over and she looked like she was ready to melt so she sat down next to me. We started talking and I found out that she is from the UK – Liverpool. I told her the company I work for has a plant in Wrexham right by Chester and she knew exactly where I was talking about. We talked about the area and she asked where I was from. I told her Arizona and she asked if is it nice, they are planning on going there next year using our Timeshare – she thought it’s in Scottsdale. So we talked about the things to do in Arizona and then we parted ways when the theater finally opened. Her and her family ended up sitting right in front of me – very nice people.

Odyssea was a good show. It’s like a Cirque du Soleil type of show. There was a contortionist, trampolines, puppets and some other clever acts. I could have easily watched the show again. There was quite a bit of acrobatics and tons of comedy.

The other show I wanted to see was Blue Horizons so I headed toward the Whale and Dolphin Stadium to wait for the next show. No shade to wait in for this show and it was hot and sunny and humid. I was starting to feel the humidity. Funny, I can handle 115 degrees with low humidity no problem, but as soon as you throw in that humidity it just wipes me out! Thankfully, the theater was opened shortly so I was able to go sit in the shade and cool off.

This was a fabulous show. There was a cute story line and there was so much going on. There were dolphins and acrobats and birds and just a ton of things to look at and see. I really enjoyed this show a lot.


Blue Horizons Show

The girl and a dolphin

Dolphin Shot

Bird Spirit

Bird Spirit in Flight

Who surfs like that?

What a cool job – that’s what I want to do when I grow up!

Up, up and away!

Dolphins are so strong and powerful

Blue and Gold Macaws in Free Flight

I was right by the Penguins again so I headed over to them one more time. I walked in and took the moving sidewalk this time.

Then it was time to head back over to the Wild Arctic to get ready for the Beluga Interaction Program. First I stopped by to see the seals at Pacific Point Preserve. They really are quite funny to watch and they love the fish so much that they jump right up on the edge and make noises to get them. Off on a ledge in the center there was one seal and it had a fish and it was playing with it. It would grab the fish and toss it in the air and catch it. If one of the birds tried to steal it the seal would move toward it and bark. It did this the entire time I was watching and was still doing it when I left. That was the first time I’d seen one of them just playing with food. Usually they gobble it down so quickly, but not this one it was just having fun.


Seal catching fish

Seal playing with fish

Seal still playing with fish

Seals in the sun

Over by the Penguins and Blue Horizons is the home of Journey to Atlantis and Krakken. I didn’t ride either of these rides this time as I was still unsure about the whole ride thing by myself and it was getting too close to time for the Belugas and I didn’t want to be late.


Journey to Atlantis

On the way to Wild Arctic I got to see the Clydesdale’s in full dress pulling the wagon. They are very impressive. As I was just passing I just kind of stood back and looked. What a gorgeous sight these horses were in full dress. Oh, and look at the puppy sitting between the drivers – so cute.


What a cute puppy!

Pretty horsey

Come on let’s go, I don’t want to stand here any more!

Back over to Wild Arctic, time for a quick bathroom break and then to find the Polar Bear statue. Okay, there’s the statue so I wait. I was leaning against a potted palm tree. A family came over and the Dad and a teenage boy leaned on the other side – here comes the next teenage son. He decided to lean on the front and the pot started to tip. All of us jumped so quickly – we all found it rather funny and had a good laugh.

While I was waiting for the program a couple about my age came over and sat down next to the statue. After a while the girl asked me if I was waiting for the Beluga Program. I said I was. We started talking and decided that it would be pretty cool if it was only the three of us. They are from the UK (seems to be a theme today) so we had a nice chat about birds and driving in the states and finally the swimsuits they had to buy because they didn’t know this program existed and had signed up this morning. Karen (the girl) was giving Christian (the boy) a bad time about his new dolphin swimming suit and she told him he was never going to wear it again. They were so nice and we were all quite comfortable with each other by the time that Eileen came out to get us. Pretty interesting I would have been the only one if Karen and Christian wouldn’t have signed up this morning. I think I’m glad there are other people, but also glad that it’s just three of us.

We handed over our waivers and headed backstage to get in to wetsuits. Oh that should be fun – not! I am not little and I am very self conscious, but I was going to have to get over this quite quickly. I hated this part. I had no idea that these things are so uncomfortable – I was feeling rather claustrophobic and I’m normally not that way, but those things squeeze you in so tight it’s ridiculous. Over all I have to say I’m pretty proud of myself for not being more self conscious – I took the challenge with as much grace as I could muster looking like a stuffed sausage! Did I mention how hot wetsuits are when you’re not in the water? Oh man, talk about a sauna – geez, I must have sweat off ten pounds it was so hot.

We all met back up with Eileen and headed around backstage. We got to see one of the Belugas in the holding pool out back and there were three baby seals (two harbor seals and an arctic seal) in another tank – they were so cute. They would get right up to the edge of the pool and just stare at you with those big brown eyes like they were begging you to come and play with them. The arctic seal was bitten by a wolf in the wild and had to be quarantined and couldn’t be released back in to the wild because of the fear of rabies. Even though she’d been tested and was healthy she could never go back in to the wild because of the bite so she’s now at Sea World in the Wild Arctic. I had no idea that seals could contract rabies – I thought that was pretty interesting. I could have played with them all day long – you just want to pick them up and hug them.

Eileen showed us the feeding chart and talked about how they make sure the animals are healthy, we saw some training tools and the slings they use to transport them out of water. In the back pool we got to see the way the floor raised up so they could get them out of the water for health checks and blood draws. The whale swims in to the area and then the area can be raised so they are out of the water. Then we saw some of the toys they use – bowling balls, basketballs, tires and all kinds of cool things for them to use.

We were then taken in to the visitor area of the Wild Arctic exhibit to look at the Beluga Whale exhibit from there and to ask questions if we had any. None of us had any questions so we weren’t out there too long. It was kind of weird feeling like you were on exhibit in the exhibit, but again I held my head high and didn’t think about how funny I must look!

Next we got to meet the trainers – Tim, Derek and Lisa. They were all three joking and laughing and giving each other a bad time. It was great. We were told not to hold on to Derek as he couldn’t swim well and we found out that they felt that Lisa was shirking her responsibilities of getting in to the very cold water. Derek informed us that he had three wetsuits on to fight the cold instead of the one we were using – then proved that he really only had one. They were friendly and very nice and put us all at ease immediately.

We got some last minute instruction and started to head in to the exhibit from the back. Oops, someone forgot to put the harbor seals out back. They both came right out of the water and where trying to get attention immediately. They were so cute and since they were there they let us each take a turn petting them. They are very smooth and soft to the touch. They didn’t want to leave and kept ignoring the commands they were being given. Finally we stepped back out of the exhibit and they called them from the holding pool out back. They were so cute it would have been great to get a picture of them. Once they were out we headed back in to the exhibit. They couldn’t stay with us because the whale would want all the attention and the seals would want all the attention and the whale would chase the seals to get them out of the way so she could have the attention – complicated lives they lead huh?

Derek and Lisa and Karen, Christian and I all sat on a ledge in the exhibit while Tim stayed out of the water over away from us. Once we were all seated the interaction began. We got to pet her, give her signals to talk and just let her get used to each of us. They don’t warm right up to people like dolphins do – they are more cautious. The trainers explained that dolphins are like dogs – pet them and they become your best friend, but Belugas are like cats they check you out and decide if they like you or not.

Kind of funny as Tim got all the visitors to oooh and aaah as we got settled. So we were on exhibit again! This time it didn’t really bother me though and it was pretty funny as they oooh’d and aaah’d with Tim.

She’s very mellow and calm and comes right up to us without any problem. At this point we each get to give her a kiss. She comes right up and bumps your cheek, but very gently. She also apparently liked my glasses and wanted to take them. This was so cool. I was on the very end so I didn’t get to pet her as much as everyone else, but I got my fair share and I was able to give her more fish and signals than the others. It was very cool.

She didn’t obey every command and when she would ignore a signal Derek made me look away until she did what she was told and then she was rewarded. It was pretty funny – she knew what was going on and she decided pretty quickly to do as told and get rewarded. We got to touch her tongue – that was pretty cool. She actually liked her tongue rubbed and it was soft and squishy. Her body was also very soft and squishy – not powerful and sleek like a dolphin – because they have so much fat to keep them warm in the cold water.

By the way, the water was 55 degrees and with the wetsuit it didn’t bother me at all, except for my hands which were totally frozen, bright red and numb pretty quickly.

Now we all get to go in to the deep water with Derek and the Beluga Whale. This should be cool. If you’ve never been in a full wetsuit before your feet want to float to the surface and to stop it you just act like you’re sitting in a chair in the water. I really didn’t have any problem with this, but Christian couldn’t do it to save his life. Every time I looked over at him he was on his stomach or his feet were in the air. Karen was laughing when she got over her fear of the deep water. That’s the second time I’ve been in a group with someone from the UK that was afraid of the deep water, same thing happened at Discovery Cove when I was there. While out there we give her a signal to splash us – cold water in the face – wow! She turned in circles with us and she came and floated out in front of us and she talked to us.

Back to ledge we swam and we all got back in our spots on the ledge one more time. Derek left the white floating fish canister pretty close to the edge of the ledge and next to the bucket of fish. While Derek and I were talking the whale came up and tried to steal the white floating fish canister and Derek leaned over to grab it and ended up losing his seat and fell right in to the water and tipped over the fish bucket. I will say that at least he did manage to grab the canister and the bucket, but fish went floating down and the whale was quite pleased. She went and got all the fish. I never would have thought about a whale being a thief, but apparently that can cause a lot of mischief if they want to. We got to do another quick interaction and pet and then it was time to get out.

This was a super experience and one that I will never forget. It was worth every penny I spent. I would do it again in a heartbeat. We headed back in to wash up and get out of our wetsuits, then we filled out a quick survey got a conservation book and key chain and were led back onstage. We were told we got to pick one 4x6 picture free and could purchase others if we wanted. All we had to do was go up front and choose the picture.

So, I headed back up front to choose my pictures and do a little shopping. It took a little while for the pictures to be downloaded, but then I was able to get my free picture and a few others. Here they are:


Nice Beluga Whale

What happened Derek – did you fall off the ledge?

Beluga and us in deep water

Hello pretty Beluga Whale

What a kiss!!!

I finished up my souvenir shopping and headed out of the park by 7:10pm. I found my car right away and I did much better driving back than I did driving there. I did end up doing a big circle around Walt Disney World, but that was okay because I got to see Spaceship Earth at Epcot. I must say that it has been a bit odd not going to the WDW parks first, but it seems to be working pretty well so far. I ended up parking in the same exact parking spot as I did yesterday.

I made it back to my room by 7:40pm. I dropped off my purchases then headed back out to Everything Pop. I picked up postcards for my Fairy Godmailer duties and went over to grab dinner. Tonight I had the Chicken Penne Alfredo, fruit bowl, tie dye cheesecake, water and a toffee bar (for later) and the total came to $20.15.

I decided to take dinner back to the room and I devoured it. I was so hungry after all the excitement and fun at Sea World. That was some of the best chicken and pasta I’d ever had. The whole meal was delicious – it really hit the spot. I have to say that I really like Pop Century so far. It has been very quiet, the food court is great and overall I’ve been very impressed.

My first day at a park all by myself and I must say I had a great time. I just went where I wanted and saw what I wanted. I didn’t feel bad missing shows or not seeing things because it was all about what I wanted to do. I still enjoyed the park and am very glad that I went.

Now it’s off to bed to catch some zzz’s before Universal tomorrow.

The firsts for today included:
Beluga Interaction Program at 4:30pm
*This will be the first time swimming with Beluga Whales. I’ve been to Discovery Cove and I loved that, but this will be something even more unique!

I highly recommend swimming with Beluga Whales – it was absolutely incredible and certainly one of the highlights of the trip!

Memories of My Second Day
The weather today was 91 degrees, hot and humid and very sunny.

The best thing today was the Beluga Interaction Program.

The worst thing today was having a sore throat and getting a sunburn.

The funniest thing today was Derek (the trainer) that fell in to the water when the Beluga Whale stole the portable fish canister.

Today I tried swimming with a Beluga Whale and the result was truly amazing.

The most magical moment today was swimming with a Beluga Whale!!! (I know I sound like a broken record, but it really was truly special.)

[Colexis Mom]

What a great day Great pictures too

[gwugirl03]

That sounds like so much fun. I think I would have been scared of the whale though. I will not even pick up a goldfish. I know, it's sad. Thanks for sharing. Your pictures are great!

[lauren-roxy]

That sounds like such a neat experience Amanda!!! I will have to keep this in mind for a future visit!! Those pictures are so cute!! Sounds like you had a pretty wonderful time!! Can't wait to read more!!