Thursday, August 21, 2008

Sea World...fun! Or is it, Sea World, fun?

When we sold Girl Scout cookies this year in our troop, the girls decided they wanted to do something fun with their cookie money. They decided they wanted to do an overnight at Sea World. They narrowed it down to staying in the Wild Arctic exhibit or the Shark Encounter. Since some of the chaperones were queasy about sharks, we booked the Wild Arctic. I had stayed there with Caitlyn when she won an overnight by selling over 500 boxes of cookies in San Diego. Let's get real - I sold over 500 boxes of cookies. And it cost me a pretty penny to have those cookies shipped all over the country, but I digress.



It started out good - everyone got there on time, we unloaded all of our luggage, put on our neon green shirts and went off with our counselors. We fed the Bat Rays squid, which was REALLY cool! You held the squid between two fingers, and they just sucked it right out of your hand. They also would let you pet them, which was pretty cool as well.



We ate dinner, pasta and hot dogs - they go together, right? And then we went to learn about sharks...their teeth, to be specific. We got to make shark tooth necklaces, and that was also fun. Who knew how many teeth and how many different kinds of teeth sharks had? They did tell us that we have a better chance of being killed by having a vending machine fall on us than having a shark bite us. I'm not sure if that was supposed to be comforting, or not....

After "class", they rushed us over to the "Shamu Rocks" show. Seeing a Shamu show at night set to rock and roll music was amazing, and they saved a whole section for us. They did have dancing trainers, which was a bit disturbing, but other than that - GREAT!


Jessica looks happy to be here, doesn't she? They really do put on a good show. On the right here is Caitlyn and Aubrey, my friend Heather's daughter at the show. They gave all of us those glow necklaces that REALLY came in handy later on when it was dark.
After the show, we went to another activity to learn more about sharks by using a shark-style Mr. Potato Head. She showed us all the pieces/parts for a shark and taught the girls how to tell the difference between a girl shark and a boy shark. They also had a tank of incubating shark eggs which reminded me strangely of vampires since they were hanging - it was creepy. The girls thought it was "awesomeness". I didn't get a picture of the creepy eggs hanging, but I did get pictures of the girls petting sand sharks. They're small and docile, so they were OK with it.

I was so prepared for our night sleeping on the hard wood floor of the Wild Arctic: single air mattress for Caitlyn, CHECK; double air mattress for me and Jessica, CHECK; warm jammies and sleeping bags, CHECK. Of course, I didn't plan on LIFE happening. As soon as we got to bed, Caitlyn started complaining that the single air mattress was not holding air. I verified it, but I was so tired, I just bellowed at her to go ahead and sleep on the other mattress with Jessica, I would suffer in silence. (OK, maybe not so silent, but suffering it would be). 10 minutes after lights out, Jessica started throwing up. In her sleeping bag. All over her warm jammies. All over the only air mattress that was inflated. Thank God the counselors were there to help out: they took the mattress, her sleeping bag, and jammie shirt and gave them to hospitality to wash. I washed Jess's hair and her body in the sink in the only bathroom we had access to. When we went back in, they gave her a sleeping bag, but she was still going to be on the hard floor so I told her to lay on top of their sleeping bag, and I unzipped mine and let her use half as a blanket. Not such a good idea - I was directly on the cold hard wooden floor freezing with only 1/2 of a sleeping bag. After a couple of hours, I asked Jessica to climb into the sleeping bag and I zipped mine up. At least I had warmth if not comfort!


They started waking us up around 6:00 am. I was glad since I hadn't slept all night. But I was an emotional mess. While we were at breakfast, my friends were just teasing me, giving me a hard time, and I burst into tears. It wasn't pretty. I'm embarassed by it, really. But, I apologized, and we moved on to the rest of the day.


Curt and Jamie came over with Cailee. They took Jessica with them to "Breakfast with Elmo" - I wish I had seen it! I guess she ran up to Elmo and Big Bird and gave them big hugs, quite unlike her mother who was afraid of large cartoon-like characters as a child. Check out the cutest girls in the world - I only wish Caitlyn had gotten in this picture!



But we decided while they were doing this, we would do the "Journey to Atlantis" ride which was like 1/2 flume ride and 1/2 roller coaster. It was really, really fun! So fun, in fact, that we went on it 2 times in a row - there was no line! We got soaked, but that was OK. Luckily, it was warmer than usual in San Diego, so although we were wet all day (the kids also insisted we sit in the "splash zone" at the Shamu show), we dried pretty quickly.


After that, Caitlyn and I broke off to meet Curt, Jamie, Cailee and Jessica to go to the Sesame Street 4D movie, "Lights, Camera, Action". I wish I had been able to take a picture of Cailee in her 3D glasses - it was priceless! We went over to feed the dolphins, but they had ended the feeding. I did get this really cute picture of Jamie and Cailee in front of Riptide Reef where the dolphins were.





The last thing we did was the one thing Jessica had to do - go to the top of the Sky Tower. It's so cool - it rotates around and you can see the whole San Diego area. It was a nice ride, and a good end to the day. We finally left the park to the complaints of all of the girls, but I was exhausted. Of course, they were asleep 5 minutes after we left the park. I'm taking today and maybe tomorrow to recover. It was a fun trip, though!

3 comments:

Kyle said...

Wow, that sounds like a lot of fun. (Not your sleeping experience though!) How about a hotel next time :) I'm glad Jessica didn't continue to be ill through the night or the next day, that's a blessing! Aren't you glad you have it all blogged and saved forever with your journaling too! Yay Tracy!!

I'm scrawlwrite said...

I think you are an awesome mom for going on that overnight. Even if everything had gone perfectly (as if) it would have been exhausting.

Nice that Curt, Jamie & Cailee joined you the next day. You're right, they are so very cute, all of them.

I'm scrawlwrite said...

Sorry, Traci - it's me, De. Forgot I was automatically signed in with this ID.