Pig Flu, Planning & Beginners Luck! -May 09- Day 4

[Hannikins]

Day 4 - Seaworld

The seaworld shuttle wasn’t due at the hotel until 9am so we took the opportunity for a nice snooze to catch up on some sleep before heading out for a leisurely breakfast. “mr sunshine” was there again, I had to stop him automatically printing off universal tickets when he saw me. Not today Mr, we’re off to seaworld!

When we arrived at seaworld I noticed a discovery cove shuttle bus picking people up, clearly I should have gotten off the i-trolley here yesterday but never mind!

Today was fairly cloudy but it was a welcome relief to the heat of yesterday. As the park was still quiet we headed off to the sealion show. On the way I noticed Manta was doing another soft launch today, I’d be back later!

I really enjoyed this show but rather depressingly the mime was by far the best part.





After the show we headed over to the shark encounter exhibition (or at least I think it was, there were frogs too. Maybe I’m wrong?).

I love the mixture of exhibits in here and we took LOTS of pictures….

Only kidding, here’s an edited selection :p







Heading back out into the hazy heat again we headed past the photo spot and couldn’t resist



We walked past the hamlet but didn’t really stop as there didn’t look to be much going on. Just shows you what happens without the offer of free beer!
This top end of the park was rather quiet so we made a beeline for the Wild Artic. We opted for the Heli ride which, if I’m honest was a little underwhelming :/

I did love the exhibits though, especially the beluga whales and this chappy



Apparently his trainer was teaching him a new trick and every time he came to the surface he’d put his flippers to his lips and blew a big kiss - bless

The walk was starting to get a little busier now so we headed in the direction of the penguin encounter and stopped off at Mama’s Kitchen on the way. This place sold probably the most healthy food in the park. We grabbed a couple of sandwiches a coke and some “chips” (see I’m learning!) to share before heading into see the penguins.

Again I was disappointed, we’d been a few years back to the new penguin exhibit at loro parc in Tenerife and this one looked small and tired in comparison.





I did love the puffins though, the music they play in there is brilliant, it’s perfectly timed with all their head bobbing to give the appearance they are dancing



The 2pm showing of blue horizons was due to start in 30 mins so we headed over to the theatre (stopping off to check in on the manatees and fit in another ride of manta on the way!)

Just before the showed started the announcer came on and said that the show was going to be a little late today as they’d had news from the spacecentre that a shuttle launch was scheduled at 2pm and in the past visitors had had a great view from the theatre, lucky us!

Unfortunately there was alot of cloud and although Adam caught a ‘moving glow’ on the camcorder I couldn’t see anything ☹

As we’d been camcorda tastic so far I don’t seem to have any pictures of this show but I wasn’t a fan. For me there was too much focus on a story (which was a little odd) when in fact all I really wanted was to see the dolphins!

As we had a while to relax before the pet ahoy show we headed over to the marina area and noticed that a presentation was just starting in the Seafire restaurant called “Wild Things”. This show wasn’t sign posted at all and you had to walk right to the back of the restaurant to get to it. The result was a lot of people walking into the restaurant looking around and leaving so it wasn’t a surprise that there were only a few families there when we arrived. I wouldn’t say it was a ‘must see’ show but it was an opportunity to get out of heat and hear about some of the small animals they have at seaworld.

We headed out of the restaurant and back into the heat. Considering it was late afternoon is was getting unbearable. It was another 30mins until the pets ahoy show but we decided to head over there early to get a good seat but more importantly to sit somewhere air conditioned! No pictures of the show I’m afraid, although we did video the whole thing! It was brilliant and I strongly advise anyone visiting seaworld to make room for this little gem!

On leaving the theatre I spied an ice cream parlour just behind Manta and feeling peckish thought we should give it a try. These things were ENORMOUS (and a bargain too at less than 3 dollars each) I had the peanut butter flavour with peanut sprinkles, and Adam had a cookie and cream type flavour with chocolate sprinkles





With ice creams in hand we headed over to watch the baby dolphins being ‘trained’ at the back of Manta. These little guys were seriously cute and didn’t seem at all timid. No photos I’m afraid, our hands were full of ice cream (yum yum!)

It was coming up to 5.30 and we wanted to catch the last showing of Believe at 6pm so we headed over to the stadium vi the walkway across the lake. With 20mins to go the stadium was starting to fill up so we decided to grab some seats before finding the loos. As we were wearing our Discoverycove passes from yesterday (our tickets for seaworld today) I was stopped every few yards by people asking for start times, directions to the toilets and the best place to sit. Probably won’t wear these again!

I arrived back at the seats just in time for the start of the show









One of the best parts of this show is when the splashing starts. I don’t think I’d ever get bored of the look of horror and genuine shock on peoples faces when they sit in a zone clearly marked as “splash zone - you WILL GET WET” and they get, well, WET! Adam caught a great one on the video camera. The guy was sat with his family videoing the show and once wet starting hurling abuse at the whale! Camera ruined I think :P

After the show finished we headed towards the exit (not our choice, we were carried there in the crowd chaos!). I managed one final ride on Manta before hitting the queue for the i-trolley. Considering how busy the park had been there was only a short queue and we got on the first trolley with minimum fuss.

Continued below...

[Hannikins]

As today has been fairly easy going we decided to go straight to a restaurant for dinner, it was already after 7 and I was STARVING! I hadn’t planned where to eat but since we were down the south end we decided to stay down there and opted for Bahama Breeze.

They had a private party on that night outside so it was a bit of a squeeze. The estimated wait for a table was 30 mins so we decided to have a starter and cocktail outside while we waited.



Adam’s was some sort of mojito, strawberry I think! and mine was the signature Bahama Breeze cocktail, a frozen bahamarita, it was AMAZING! So much so I ordered another!

As we didn’t know how long a wait we’d have left we ordered one roasted Cuban bread to share.



Halfway through our buzzer went off so with the help of a server we moved indoors.

The cocktails were starting to take effect…



ANOTHER COCKTAIL LATER…



After a short wait the food arrived. Adam was still feeling a little off so he’d gone for a starter as a main couse, Fire-roasted Jerk Shrimp.



I went for the Jamaican grilled chicken breast.



If I’m honest I wasn’t that keen on the mango sauce and the chicken didn’t really have much taste without it so in the end Adam finished it off. I was disappointed since I’d read some great things about the food here, however the cocktails more than made up for it.

We were both full and rather tipsy by now so decided we’d skip dessert and move onto the coffee.

I had a liqueur coffee and Adam had something with Baileys in it! It came in a rather strange coffee mug but WHOA was it strong!



Full and a little unsteady on our feet we headed to the i-trolley stop, there were a few people waiting and we’d just missed a trolley while trying to leave bahama breeze (Adam had started a new section of our holiday video called ‘cocktail cam’ or as ! later renamed it “I-Drive through the eyes of a drunk brit”). While waiting for a trolley a white shuttle bus pulled up and a guy up front shouted to see if anyone needed a lift. YES PLEASE I shouted and headed towards the bus door. Adam gave me a looked which said “are you mad?!?!?” and so did a fair few of the other guests, in fact. Only ourselves and one other couple took the guy up on his offer. You see I knew something they didn’t (thanks to the dibb!), this was a FUNSPOT BUS! Totally free, no strings attached (unless you consider having to watch an on board video about the park in Kissimmee that is). We were dropped right outside our hotel and I gave the guy some dollars for his trouble (I’m a great tipper while tipsy!).

VERY early start tomorrow as we’re off to Busch Gardens, I’m going to regret that fourth cocktail in the morning I just know it!

Day 5 - Busch Gardens >>>

[Guest]

Great piccies, I love Sea World!

Those photos of Dawn Brancheau summed up how much she loved what she did and nobody will do 'something far greater' better than her - she will be sadly missed

[Hannikins]

is that her? I was never sure, was a shame to hear what happened

[Disney_Diva]

Fantastic report and photos x

[stace&tink]

great report and also great pics of dawn brancheau ... just see how happy she is.

[Iloveflorida]

Great day and I can't wait to eat in Bahama Breeze now, just for the cocktails!

[Redrach1903]

Great pic of Dawn there...RIP

Lol at your tipsy-ness

xx

[Hannikins]

Originally Posted by Iloveflorida

Great day and I can't wait to eat in Bahama Breeze now, just for the cocktails!

See more...

do they are the BEST!

[louiseybobs]

Great pics and I'm loving reading your trip reports, just a quick question, how can you tell its a funspot bus? or is it just instinct? haha x