Believe

Believe was the name of the Orca show at SeaWorld. I'm not sure why .... but let me tell you, it was the best trained animal show I have ever seen.

There were quite a few Orca, although only one or two 'on stage' at once, and because they are so big, they can do some pretty spectactular tricks. Zooming up from underneath the water with a trainer on its nose to a height of 10 metres or so - actually that was probably more difficult for the trainer! Lots of splashing, jumping, and a lovely section where an Orca and a female trainer did a kind of slow dance in the water, lying on their backs, lots of tender physical contact between the two of them. The whole thing was very slick, fully orchestrated with inspirational music, which makes it sound awful but the sight of those massive predators interacting with their trainers with such confidence and trust was pretty impressive. To give you an idea of the size of the animals, you know how in dolphin shows the animal is given a fish as a reward for performing an activity - well, in the Orca show, the trainer would throw a whole bucket of fish into the gaping, teeth-filled mouth of the cheeky-faced super-dolphin! The show was great, well worth the entrance fee. There's also an underwater viewing gallery where you can watch the Orca swimming around between shows.

Before the 'Believe' show there was a tribute to US and allied forces currently serving, including having any currently serving servicepersons stand up for a round of applause.

Of course there were other animals at SeaWorld that we were also excited to see. The dolphin show was very good and included two pilot whales (the black animals on either side of the dolphins).

The 'soak zone' was the first 12 rows - and it was true - the animals had been trained to use their tails to deliberately splash the spectators - this is a pilot whale I think.


There were sweet faced Belugas, again with an underwater viewing gallery.


Watching the manatees was also a treat for us. No photo of these unfortunately. These massive paddle-tailed water mammals give the lie to the theory that you can't get fat eating salad! Their natural habitat is the Florida swamps but sadly they are now endangered there.

A real hit with kids (including ours) was the bat ray encounter pool. These large stingrays had been trained to hang about on the surface of the large pool so that you could touch them. They felt unexpected, velvety but slimy at the same time.

There were also massive walruses, including one sporting large gnarled tusks, making him look like something out of a fairy tale.

There were other exhibits, the usual aquaria etc but by the time we got to them the park was so crowded that you couldn't see much. Tip - go early because after lunch it gets really really crowded! There were also rides, but neither of the riders in our party could be bothered to line up to go on them.

So that was SeaWorld. We did get lost again, in both directions, despite the excellent Map Quest instructions. Actually we didn't get lost so much as just missed offramps. You really do need to know which lane to be in to come off in the right place as traffic is fast and unforgiving and they follow closely behind you, making last minute lane-changes rather life-threatening. Still, at least we can get onto the freeways now, which is a step beyond where we were a few days ago, just have to learn to get off them. As a friend of ours from San Diego now living in Auckland pointed out, he had the same trouble trying to find on-ramps to Auckland's motorways when he first arrived. Ah yes, but there is a difference - in San Diego you know there is an on-ramp, you just can't find it. In Auckland, half the time there just isn't one!