TOSSIN' & TURNIN': Fans follow as a killer whale trainer points the way for her charge (top) and Kraken dips toward its final destination (bottom).
COAST-TO-COASTER
THE POET WINGED HIS WAY SOUTH TO join up for a couple days before his local business conference.
I scooped him up at the Orlando airport and, loving zoos and aquariums, I later found myself at Sea World in the line for a (gulp!) floorless roller coaster dubbed "Kraken" (Oh, how sweet! Baby's first coaster!). The Poet "dragged" me toward the head of line, whispering wonderful words of encouragement to me, like "Hey, listen, don't worry, most people don't lose any limbs or anything!.........Usually." It was more fun than I thought it was going to be, whipping around upside down then looping around and around, although I did think I might lose my head as the coaster dived into a tunnel.
Further wanderings brought us face-to-glass with huge walruses, polar bears, Beluga whales, and lengthy moray eels. One park restaurant featured sharks swimming in long floor-to-ceiling tanks as diners snacked in front of them.
Sitting in Shamu Stadium we were treated to the first day of practice of a new killer whale show the park is producing. In sync with symphonies, the action was great, with trainers dancing with the whales, being tossed about like circus acrobats and the whales slapping their huge tails to soak the audience (How do you train a whale to do that?) While marveling at the interaction between the trainers and the whales, one can’t help wondering who it was, way-back-when, who first slipped into a closed tank with one of these deadly behemoths.
A later visit to the Budweiser hospitality area for coupla-coupla beers helped us damp down the 90-degree-plus heat.
As we left the park, looking around at all the arresting combinations of tints and shades, the architecture and technology along with the humanity in countless shapes and sizes, races, creeds and colors, I was reminded of a line from a favored flick: a French actor in the whirly-bird cap pulls up in a convertible atop some big-city hills and amazingly pleased at his surroundings, proclaims in his native tone, “Ah!... Great! Big! Plastic America!”
THE POET WINGED HIS WAY SOUTH TO join up for a couple days before his local business conference.
I scooped him up at the Orlando airport and, loving zoos and aquariums, I later found myself at Sea World in the line for a (gulp!) floorless roller coaster dubbed "Kraken" (Oh, how sweet! Baby's first coaster!). The Poet "dragged" me toward the head of line, whispering wonderful words of encouragement to me, like "Hey, listen, don't worry, most people don't lose any limbs or anything!.........Usually." It was more fun than I thought it was going to be, whipping around upside down then looping around and around, although I did think I might lose my head as the coaster dived into a tunnel.
Further wanderings brought us face-to-glass with huge walruses, polar bears, Beluga whales, and lengthy moray eels. One park restaurant featured sharks swimming in long floor-to-ceiling tanks as diners snacked in front of them.
Sitting in Shamu Stadium we were treated to the first day of practice of a new killer whale show the park is producing. In sync with symphonies, the action was great, with trainers dancing with the whales, being tossed about like circus acrobats and the whales slapping their huge tails to soak the audience (How do you train a whale to do that?) While marveling at the interaction between the trainers and the whales, one can’t help wondering who it was, way-back-when, who first slipped into a closed tank with one of these deadly behemoths.
A later visit to the Budweiser hospitality area for coupla-coupla beers helped us damp down the 90-degree-plus heat.
As we left the park, looking around at all the arresting combinations of tints and shades, the architecture and technology along with the humanity in countless shapes and sizes, races, creeds and colors, I was reminded of a line from a favored flick: a French actor in the whirly-bird cap pulls up in a convertible atop some big-city hills and amazingly pleased at his surroundings, proclaims in his native tone, “Ah!... Great! Big! Plastic America!”
* * *
An amusing sidebar to the Sea World visit had a park tour guide dancing up to me soon after we entered and cajoling me to sing along with the Muzak blaring over the speakers, declaring “Hey, it’s from ‘Fiddler on the Roof!’ You should know all the words!” I didn’t but, by his actions, I was pretty sure he had the lyrics committed to memory. It wasn’t ‘til about an hour later it dawned on me that I was wearing a T-shirt advertising a rendition of the play. Duh!
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