Day 7: Sea World
Yesterday, we ended with a deluge at Epcot after a marvelous day at Discovery Cove. Today, we were going to try to utilize Orlando public transportation, LYNX, to get to Sea World.
I had initially planned to pick up the LYNX at Downtown Disney, but when we arrived at the Disney bus stop the CM told us that busses dont go to Downtown Disney until later in the day, so wed have to go to the Transportation and Ticket Center, via the Magic Kingdom. As we were sitting waiting, another bus pulls up and has a conversation with the CM who called us over. Apparently, the driver had to go to DTD Score! We climbed on the bus, which BTW had pools of water on some of the seats. I imagine a lot of very wet people rode it the night before. He showed us what our stop would be and dropped us off across the street for safety reasons. Our bus showed up about 5 minutes later. The busses are very nice almost like charter busses, and very clean. It was $2 for me and $1 for Madeline. We arrived at a stop by the Sea World parking lot about 10-15 minutes later. NB: the bus has way more stops than show on the schedule. Be sure to have the driver tell you when to get off. Well, it was about 8:30 am and here we were:
We crossed the parking lot and made it up to here:
We had quite a wait, and it was not like at Disney. People did not start showing up until nearly 9 am. We had asked a question about our DC passes and park maps and a very nice employee chatted us up and gave us tips about feeding the animals.
I enjoyed not dealing with money at Disney, so we had decided to do the all day dining, but you have to buy that inside the park. The gift shop outside was open and we bought some postcards and some spray on sunscreen yeah! Remember we had those bone white parts in our hair that needed to be protected!
The weather was not great, and so there were not many people there when the park opened. When we went in we took care of the all-day dining and went in search of breakfast. There was one restaurant that offered breakfast on the all day dining plan. Oops after hunting it down, it was closed for renovation and none of the other open places participated in the dining deal.
So we just had a huge waste of time for nothing (that was a Sea World theme for us). We could get something at 10 am. We strolled back toward the things we wanted to do that morning: dolphin feeding and Manta. We stopped by here:
To see the baby dolphins with their moms. I wish their enclosure was larger.
Then we headed over to Manta
This is the seat you can try out before heading on line. We then put everything in storage lockers. Bring lots of quarters if you like the thrill rides. We ended up after the third time just keeping most of our stuff in the lockers for the rest of the day. I was glad I had deep pockets! Oh, another tip double and triple check make sure your kid gives you everything she wants kept in the locker before you lock it!
Manta is a fun ride! The queue has some really great aquariums. I took some pictures on a later ride that I will post later. Sea World, however, is not as clean as Disney. There is a gum receptacle that looked like it hadnt been cleaned out in a week and it was 9:20 in the morning!
Icky! Anyway, after cruising the non-existent line we were ready to board. Madeline needed a little boost to get in the seat. Soon we were securely strapped in. Then they swing you up so you are prone. It is surprisingly comfortable. Madeline did great! She is learning to be fearless! After flipping and zooming we were done but we would be back.
We headed out. They had guards so I couldnt redneck our ride photo. I refuse to pay $20 for a ride photo.
I think we rode Kraken next. It was fun but nothing to write home about and we did not return today.
Next up, dolphin feeding. The dolphin feeding and stingrays are right next to each other. You can pay $10 to feed the stingrays, sea lions and sharks. That is a $5 saving over paying for each individually. They give you a card and punch out the holes. The dolphin feeding is $7 per tray. Youd think that wed have had enough dolphin yesterday, but we were game for some more.
You can see the sun is coming out.
Alright, I need to get back to work.