getting to seaworld from our hotel wasn't difficult. we had already familiarized ourselves with the trolley. we took the green line to oldtown, then transferred to the no9 bus that would take us right up to seaworld. easy peasy.
when we got to seaworld, we saw many many cars trying to get a parking space. it was also a bit packed getting into the bus stop. that got me worried a bit. it was sunday, the last sunday before christmas. school holidays has started. i wasn't prepared for the crowd.
surprisingly though, getting our bags checked and getting through the entrance with our city pass didn't take too long. no queue there. seaworld had a big map with the rides and restaurants and shows at the back. nicer than disneyland's actually…disneyland separated maps and their pages of show times.
the boys and their daddy went straight to the explorer's reef once we got in. they wanted to touch the star fish and shark and let the cleaner fish get a bite of them. while they did that i mapped out our path for the day and crossed out what i didn't want to see. we had four shows to watch and four rides to take.
the first show on our list was the shamu show but we had an hour before it started so we went to the bay of play first, since its the closest to the entrance. akmal was over the moon but he got a bit upset as elmo himself wasn't at the park. the boys got on all 3 sesame street rides. got that over and done with.
we walked to the dolphin point next. it was breathtaking to see dolphins up close. they are really cheeky animals. asyraf was especially happy he got to touch a dolphin. amir was more interested in playing with them while they were underwater.
we then walked towards shamu stadium but stopped to see shamu in his behind the glass wall. the boys were ooh-ing and ahh-ing, killer whales are huge!
we headed to the shamu show. the boys of course ran towards the soak zone. they wanted to get wet. while we loved the killer whales' antics, we felt it was a bit of an over-the-top marketing announcement seaworld put up. they kept repeating again and again about the wonderful work they are doing. i know that they are being bashed by animal lovers about keeping wild animals locked but come on, if we go to seaworld that would mean we don't necessarily subscribe to that school of thought. anyway, we walked out of the stadium soaked to the bone and happy we get to see killer whales in action.
first stop after the show was to get out of our wet clothes and into some (new) dry clothes.
we then walked towards our first ride but toilet breaks and grumbling stomachs took us off course for a bit. when we continued with our walk we were arguing with the boys who wanted to go on shipwreck rapids. they couldn't go on by themselves and hubby didn't want to go on the ride because he was still shivering from the soaking we got by shamu. so we gave that a miss. we also crossed out the mantra because asyraf couldn't make up his mind weather he wanted to go on it or not.
we walked to the next show - the sea lions and otters show. that's a funny one, loved the song and dance and comedic routine put up by the animals and their trainers. and the csi theme song too. they also slipped in their 'we are good' announcements but the oppa gangnam style ending made up for that.
then it was the shark encounter before going in for our third show, the dolphin show. this one was slightly different than the gold coast seaworld show as the trainers had their stint as well. but the dolphins were as playful and charismatic as the gold coast ones.
once we finished we all three shows, we walked around to see all the other animals, the penguins at penguin encounter and the polar bears, the beluga whale, the walrus at wild arctic. we went to the other side to take the journey to atlantis but that was closed for maintenance. the poor boys didn't get to go on any ride this time.
we walked back to the centre of the park to take the sky tower ride. the lights were already on in the park so we got to see the christmas decoration, the christmas tree and the animals swimming around in their own pool.
before we left the park, we gave the boys some time to run around at the play area near elmo's bay of play. we took the bus back to old town and then the trolley back to little italy. our dinner was again at the kebab place and we went home to pack our bags as we'll be off to los angeles tomorrow.
personally i prefer gold coast's seaworld. we were there from opening and closing and didn't have any time unused. the show stars were the animals and they had many, many rides. san diego's seaworld had put a little too much defensive mode during their shows that irked us a bit. their rides were not that many and they didn't even have a 3D show. so gold coast seaworld won it for us.
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