Tied Together in Knotts: Sea World

When we went to Disney 3 years ago we didn't have time to do Sea World but we kept promising Raegan that we would go sometime. She's asked us NUMEROUS times when we were going. Before Joel and I left for Puerto Rico we surprised her with the news that we would be going to Sea World when we got back. It gave her something to look forward to and helped keep her mind off mom and dad being gone so long.

So July 7th (2 weeks after we returned from PR) we took off for Orlando - flying, that is! There's no way we could drive that far and survive the car sickness between Raegan and I.

When we arrived at the Renaissance and checked into our room this was on the tub - isn't it cute?!

The room was great - the hotel was directly across from Sea World and our room faced the resort so we could watch the fireworks every night from the comfort of our beds!

Posing!

If you've never been to Sea World, you've gotta go! The shows are amazing! We saw every single one there was - all of them! We got some great seats clear down front.......

...but it's the soak zone!!!

The killer whale and dolphin trainers do some amazing stunts, it is just so exciting to watch

The highlight of the trip was the Dolphin Spotlight Tour that we scheduled ahead of time. We spent an hour behind the scenes with the dolphins and trainers. Raegan absolutely LOVES dolphins and she had never been this close to one. What an experience for all three of us.

This was so touching to watch

Saying hi to us

Here we are meeting the three boys that we were going to train.

"Is anyone watching me?" I don't know what we were looking at but our little guy was showing off for us and we weren't even paying attention.

Feeding them fish - oooh yuck!

We were splashed more than once as you can see!

When we finished our bucket of fish it was time to go.

So, I guess you can't go to Florida without getting a hairwrap - well, that's what Raegan said.

This stayed in until the day before school, when I cut it out of her head. Not the whole chunk - each strand of string one at a time.

This is this the infamous Luau dinner at Sea World, can't think of the Hawaiian name at the moment but it's a must see when you go. They greet you with a lei, tatoos and drinks while you wait to be seated.

They perform the entire time and keep bringing the food to your table. It's family style.
They taught some volunteers a dance and of course Raegan was one of them on stage.

This little girl was darling, we think she was the daughter of the main character in the show.

After the luau we RAN to the Shamu Rocks! Show. It's performed at night with lights and rock music, a lot of fun!

These were the only 2 pics I got before it got too dark. They just wouldn't do it any justice.

The newest part of Sea World is it's own water park called Aquatica, it's a childs dream park - everything is water, you never have to dry off! ha ha

Raegan makes friends everywhere she goes - must be because she's an only child (or maybe because she's a McCoy) - this little girl was from Wales and they exchanged addresses.

Joel and Raegan wading into the wave pool while it was calm - we went all the way out to the deep and rode the waves. They are so much fun - like being at the beach.

Walking through the shark tank. Some people chose to do the Shark Tour and they actually suited up and got in a shark cage and went down in these waters to be next to the huge sharks of all kind in there.

The leafy sea dragon. We had never seen one of these, what an amazing use of camouflage. It's creator made it to look like the sea weed to protect it from it's predators. Can you make out it's shape? It's like a seahorse with leaves.