First Time at SeaWorld Orlando

After living in Florida for 12 years is a little hard to believe that I had never visited SeaWorld. This is probably the only theme park in Orlando that I never visited before. Maybe because I only went to theme parks if I had friends in town and most of them wanted to go to Universal Studios or Disney. The real reason to buy the annual pass this year is that SeaWorld and Busch Gardens have a Latin music festival this month. One of my favorite bands from Cali, my hometown, was playing in SeaWorld last weekend. I went to the concert with a friend from Cali. We had fun singing (screaming) all of El Grupo Niche songs. 

I have some issues regarding animals in captivity, but at the same time this is the only way that we can see them and fall in love with them. I love animals, I want to touch them and feed them. At the same time,   I feel guilty because of people like me they probably will never be free. If you ever watched the documentary The Cove you will feel guilty as well. Besides my guilt, SeaWorld was amazing!!!! If I had been here as a kid, I would probably be a marine biologist instead of an engineer. 

The first thing that we did was buying food the dolphins. You have to pay $6 for the food.  This was the first time that I touched a dolphin and I will happily pay again to feed them. The $20 picture that the SeaWorld photographers took of me wasn't that good and I decided not to buy it.

$6 dolphin food

Beautiful Bottlenose dolphins

me and a happy dolphin

Under the dolphin pool there is an aquarium. It was beautiful and with Enya songs playing it was really peaceful. I could have stayed there for hours watching the dolphins swim. 

We had some time before the concert and headed to the dolphin's show.

I did a few videos of the concert but they are really painful to watch. The image is shaky from the dancing and our voices are NOT that great. Their most popular songs are about Cali and when you live far away they sound even better. 

El Grupo Niche, SeaWorld

El Grupo Niche

After the concert we went to see the killer whale's show. It was perfect since the show lasted as long as the rain. This was my favorite show. Orcas are beautiful. The trainers are not allowed to be in the water with the whales after a trainer was killed during a show a couple of years ago. 

Orcas kissing

Photo credit: www.seaworldparks.com

We didn't have enough time to see all the shows or exhibits. I was not rushed to see everything in one day. I still have about half of the park to see and one year to go back. I didn't take my DSLR, but I will on our next visit and take better pictures. 

John's Pass & Madeira Beach

A couple of weeks ago, I had friends in town. They wanted to go to John's pass to take a dolphin watching cruise. I had never heard of this place and I didn't know about the dolphin watching activities. I left work early that Friday afternoon to meet them. Sadly, they left too early on the 3:00 PM boat and the following boat was scheduled at 6:00 PM. I was disappointed that they didn't want to do the later ride but they have two kids under 2. I understood and didn't see any dolphins that day. However, I was intrigued about this place. 

Last weekend, it was raining non stop. There isn't much to do around here except go to the beach or go to a theme park. Andre and I drove 40 minutes to John's pass to have dinner by the water . I was excited to see a new place that according to some web searches is the number 1 tourist attraction on that side of town. John's pass is a boardwalk with restaurants, shops, a fishing pier, and boats offering tours. We had dinner at Friendly Fisherman Restaurant. We had a great table by a window facing the water. The food was OK.  It was rated on urbanspoon at 65% as well as the other restaurants nearby. After dinner, we saw a few dolphins from the boardwalk. I noticed that there are boats that can also take you to Shell Island, a barrier island that I used to go years ago. I have to look into that since this place is only accessible by boat. 

Friendly Fisherman Restaurant

Fresh dinner

After dinner, we noticed that the clouds were gone and that on the other side of the road there was a beautiful sunset. We quickly found a parking spot and I got a few sunset pictures from Madeira Beach. 

Sunset from Madeira Beach

This was a great Sunday afternoon. We are having Andre's sister visiting next month. She will be in Tampa only for 3 days. We might go back to John's Pass and Madeira Beach.

Old Travel Pictures - Chicago

I'm having some computer issues and my laptop is now at the apple store getting a new battery. I had some drafts for a while in my blog that I completely forgot about. I'm using the blogger app from the iphone to publish this post. 

These pictures were taken on a trip to Chicago in 2007. We were on our way to the Adler Planetarium to see the City's skyline from there. At the time, I didn't care too much about sunsets. Now that I like to take sunset pictures I would love to go back to this place. That was the year that I traveled the most. I was in graduate school, working part time, and southwest had great fares that summer. I took advantage of the cheap air tickets and got away at least every 2 weeks for the weekend. I'm lucky to have friends that live in fun places so I didn't have to pay for a hotel. I miss those days so much. 

View from my friend's apartment. Lake Michigan in the back.

Chicago's skyline at night

Buckingham Fountain at Night

Chicago is one of my favorite Cities in the US. I need to plan a visit soon. My last trip to this wonderful City was in 2008. Another visit is long overdue. I was lucky to get good night pictures that day. I never get good night shots. If anyone gets good night pics without a tripod please let me know how. I have many pictures of old trips. I might look for them and at the same time do a good computer back up. 

A Day in Busch Gardens

Last weekend I went to Busch Gardens with my family. There was a famous salsa singer, Victor Manuelle, for the Viva La Musica Festival. I have been to Busch Gardens countless times. They have a great Florida resident pass where you can pay for one day and return the whole year. In my opinion, the roller coasters are probably better than the ones in the Orlando theme parks. Busch Gardens Tampa has an African theme with several roller coasters in between the large zoo areas. This was my first visit to the park after 3 years. A lot has changed including Cheetah Hunt, a new roller coaster. Also there is a new Sesame Street section for the kids and a Kangaroo and wallaby petting area. 

Guazi

Sheikra's 90 degree fall

Mom and Baby

I just got back from Sea World today. It was my first visit to that park. I will upload pictures on another post. Have you ever been to Busch Gardens or Sea World?