A totally different park today, which allowed us to marvel at the wildlife and also enjoy “all the thrills of the fair”. Unfortunately, we left our patriarch at the villa to rest and recuperate, but once we’d ensured he was comfortable and had enough provisions five intrepid explorers braved the high seas – (aka the busy interstate at rush hour) to visit Seaworld.

Beginning on the Manta, a wonderful ride that flips you forward so you glide around like a stingray, we joined the 60-minute queue, which we’re sure we conquered within 25 mins.  (This is the ride pictured in the headline image.)

As we walked our first lap of the park we found a Shark Encounter, a huge aquarium which you experience from below by walking through a huge tunnel. Along the pathway, there are lots of pictures and signs explaining what all the fish are. After you exit the tunnel, there’s a cross-section of the huge tunnel and a sign telling you that it’s engineered to support 450 tonnes of water which is the same as a herd of 270 elephants.  

Next up was the Rumba Rapids, where the junior team took the baton and led the charge, while we remained on the bridge so we could maximise photo opportunities. (aka stay dry!) 

For those who haven’t visited Seaworld, the arenas which host the shows are scattered across the park, with the other attractions nestled around them. The unfortunate downside to this is you spend ages walking around the park as the shows aren’t neatly arranged in time order along a single loop of the park. I suspect this is deliberate to help prevent herd behaviour as the eager crowd moves from one show to the other.

We enjoyed the Dolphin show, which began with a jolly rotund woman, with a round face, a big smile and a really loud voice, wearing a shocking lime outfit to ensure she was easily spotted, who warmed the crowd up and entertained the children with a dolphin pop quiz. Once the crowd was seated and it was time to start the show, the trainers walked on stage in their wetsuits and introduced their dolphin by name. The show was slanted towards being educational and explained that the “playtime” we were watching was a necessary part of the dolphin’s daily activities to help them socialise and bond with their pod.

 
A little girl was chosen to meet a dolphin, (I suspect her parents paid for a close encounter). After feeding them some fish the trainer smelt her hands and looking at the girl said “oh no, our hands smell of fish guts” and then to her mother (standing a few metres further back) “that journey back home is going to be long, sorry about that!” Back to the little girl, “you know how we get rid of the smell? (shake head) Rub them together really fast like this (girl copies) and then dry them on your shorts like this (cue rubbing hands on thighs). But the trainer had failed to factor in the girls disgust at the thought of smelling like fish guts. So a few minutes later after getting the dolphin to wave it’s flipper at her and do another trick, when the trainer repeated the command to “rub you hands together very fast and dry them on your shorts”, the little girl rubbed her hands very fast, stepped forward and rubbed them on the trainer! At this point the audience collapsed into laughter, whoops of delight and applause. And the trainer was left looking stunned. I guess the trainer forgot the first rule of entertainment – never work with children and animals.

Next, we hiked over to the Sealion and Otter show which was held in a smaller arena with a much smaller pool, but also a large concrete area covered in very shallow water (5mm) to ensure the sea lions could glide easily over it. They’d written the script, so the Otters were the comedians of the show and in true pantomime style, we needed to tell the host “it’s behind you” and so on. One of the audience had clearly paid for an “up close” photo experience. When they called him forwards, the sealion dived into the pool and swam to the glass front and propelled itself out of the water to rest its front flippers on the glass. (cue photo – so far so good). But when the walrus appeared and mounted the front of the tank for a photo opportunity with the same guy, the cameras clicked and then the walrus turned a 180 and drenched the guy to the sound of loud laughter from the audience and a splattering of applause. 

By this time Dan had built a thirst for another rollercoaster, so we walked over to Ice Breaker and Liz generously looked after the bags as we rode the giant orange coaster. I’ve included a video, so you can experience the ride from your armchair. And when it runs backwards, don’t assume it’s an added cinematic effect, the ride really does roll backwards that quickly.

Due to the incredibly short ride queues, we were able to access our next ride, Kraken within 10 minutes. Due to the ride queue being so short / non-existent the younger crew wanted to ride it again, which they did, while we rescued the bags from Liz and sipped our water as the afternoon sun was scorchingly hot.

By now it was time to stroll over to the Orca arena and find our seats for the show. Unfortunately, the start of the show coincided with the incoming storm and the show was delayed and then cancelled. Fortunately, the killer whales had been swimming around in the giant pool and amusing the audience with splashes and other small tricks e.g. bobbing the top half of their body out of the tank or pushing up onto the display area at the front of the tank. This gave the audience a few photo opportunities and a taster of what the show would offer but it was pretty disappointing to have not seen the show in full.

Doe to the heavy rain, we sheltered under the outer canopy of the arena before making a mad dash back to the van amid the torrential rain. At least it was warm(ish) and not UK-style ice-cold rain. But unlike the UK, the rain was so hard you were engulfed in a haze of water which reduced longer-range visibility quite substantially.