Written by Cody
One of my favorite things to do on vacation is to wake up to
an alarm…. Not really, but I knew today was a big day for the other half. She
is very serious about her bucket list and one of the things on it is to swim
with dolphins. Call me an ole farm boy, but I have never had the urge to get in
the water with a giant sea mammal. I know they are no whale, but still huge
compared to the foot long fish I have handled at best.
It was a pretty early rise to throw on our swim suits and
some over cloths comb the fangs (brush teeth) and roll. Roll has become quite
the popular saying with yours truly after being in Alabama for a few days. Roll
tide roll!! It was a bit of a rainy morning, but there was nothing bringing the
mood down when it came to playing with dolphins as the outcome. There was a
long three hour drive. Not just a normal interstate set the cruise and roll, no
this was stop and go right near the cost slow and go driving. The highlight of
the drive was finding Flora-bama and stopping at McDonalds to grab a southern
biscuit breakfast which we do not have in the Midwest.
Long drive, but we made it. Tosh has a great love of being
early, not being a little early, but being two hours and 800 minutes early. I
had a feeling this place was not huge and their highlight was their dolphins,
but did not voice this to the other half. We got signed in and pointed to the
right direction when the time came for our plunge with the giant fishes…. The
swim with dolphins… one in the same I thought. The place we were attending this
at was called Gulf World in Panama City FL. Should probably throw that out
there in case any would like to attend this as well. We walked around for a bit
checking out their great exotic bird collection and their small, but cool
aquarium area. They had very interesting shows and different feedings or small
sharks, tortoises, and seals. Let me tell you their dolphin exhibit was spot
on. Before we swam they had a show in the dolphin tank. It was spectacular! We
have seen a few at other larger aquariums and they got nothing on this place.
The trainers got in with the dolphins and played for parts. It was very
awesome.
A few after the show was over, it was our time to get in.
The program said there could be up to 20 people in our group. This made me worried
about time and being freaked out by large fish in front of people. On a side
not, I would like to throw out there that I completely understand that dolphins
like whales are mammals not fish. Fish takes much less time to type the large
sea dwelling mammals. Any who, the group was about 16. It was split up into to
two smaller groups with four dolphins used. Two males on one end with one
trainer and an assistant also with a photo taker. The other side was two
females with the same trainer and helpers. I was chosen as a volunteer to swim
out to do the foot push. I am always down for being a guinea pig, but I swim
like a kid who didn’t get in a pool for the first time until he was in middle
school. I don’t call is swimming I call it surviving. The dolphins pushing be
was crazy awesome. The power they have and they almost balanced be as they
pushed. It was so cool!
We did our poses and did another fin grab pull thing, all
insanely awesome, but the best was the hug. To feel the size and the weight of
the dolphin was like nothing else. Another thing that I would like to mention
was the trainers and their connection with their animals.
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