Part 12

December 13, 2005

Concerning Our Cast:

*Crystal (WDW Poly Princess)- Turning 23 on this trip, my 5^th trip to WDW, 3^rd solo trip. 

*Kiki- Friend from Orlando who makes a cameo appearance as our superhero, Airport Transport Girl.

*Katie- Twenty-something friend who lives just outside of Orlando.  We met on an online horse message board about ten years ago, and have been in touch ever since.

*JP- Katie’s brother, who I’ve talked to online for years, but have never met until now.

Being the dedicated, responsible Trip Reporter that I am, I of course have no notes for today, just pictures.  Hey, it's only been 8 months, I'm sure I can remember everything that happened!

After a much needed night's sleep, Katie came to pick me up to go to Sea World.  The original plan had been for her brother to come with us, but he had a late night the night before, so he would be joining us later that night. 

I snapped a photo of the Bus Stop from the night before as we drove by.  We ran about three times the distance that you see in this photo to catch the bus. 

We managed to make it to Sea World in one piece, with all of the necessary equipment.  We were off to a better start today already!

Our first stop was the dolphin nursery, where we got to watch some baby dolphins playing with their mothers.  Cute!  Next was the manatees, who were eating lettuce.  The lettuce was being thrown into their tank from above, which we decided they must think was "Lettuce from heaven!"

Oh, yummy Lettuce from Heaven!

Next we went to check out the sting rays, where I decided to fork over the $4 for a paper cup box o dead fish to feed them.

Can we take a moment here to examine the fact that I have a *DEAD FISH* wedged in between my fingers? 

And also that I have it stuck deep into a big pond of cold, murky water, waiting for a giant slippery creature to swim over my hand and suck the fish (and possibly my fingers!) up into it's waiting mouth?

Okay, just wanted to point that out.

The funny thing is that contrary to what you expect, rays did not stampede in the direction of my hand when I put the fish in the water.  In fact, they ignored me.  For several minutes, they ignored me!  Now, if there's anything squickier than having a dead fish wedged between your fingers in a big pond of cold, murky water, it's having to KEEP it there for several minutes!  I started pleading to the rays to hurry up and come eat the stupid fish, and FINALLY, they did!

As you can see in this photo (kind of), once the first couple of fish had been discovered, my side of the pond was swarmed by rays!  I had to wait for a spot to clear to be able to stick my hand in!  This, I must say, is highly preferable to having to wait around with a dead fish squished between your fingers, but still kind of creepy.

"Look how gross this is!"

I spent a while wondering exactly how they kill all of the dead fish they sell for feeding, but Katie decided this was too depressing a subject. 

One of the fun parts of feeding sting rays is getting to wash off your arm (not your hands, but your ARM) at the little sink station afterwards.  Here I am rubbing vigorously, and repeating "Unclean!  Unclean!"

Next up was the Shamu show to check out the orcas. 

If I recall correctly, the whale on the left weighs around 5000 lbs, and the one on the right weighs in at 12,000.

Pretty cool that a creature weighing THAT much can propel itself out of the water like this! 

To Katie's credit, she didn't walk off and pretend she didn't know me.  She did, however, laugh.  A lot.  Probably still is.

Note the very authentic looks of fear.  Someone could get killed! 

This polar bear photo turned out kind of blurry, but if you saw the 92486 attempted whale and walrus photos I took in this arctic exhibit, you would think this polar bear one was a masterful work of art.  I am, however, the proud owner of a whole series of photos I like to call "Whale blur."

The guys cleaning the streets looked at us kind of funny for walking across the lawn to pose with big white wooden things, but we didn't let that stop us.

By now, we had seen a lot (half of which I have now obviously forgotten.  There were penguins and sharks in there somewhere.) and my feet were killing me from a whole week of Theme Parking.  We decided to call it a day, but I wanted to stop and see the sea turtles first, so that was our last stop on the way out.

Anyone who saw my Virginia trip photos knows that I have a bad history of not being able to photograph sea turtles, and so I present this photo as proof that I really can take non-blurry pictures of them, in which the entire turtle is in the frame!  I have to admit, I expected the turtle exhibit to have an underwater viewing kind of thing, because quite frankly, swimming turtles are way cooler than sitting around turtles!

Katie dropped me off back at my resort so that she could go home to get a nap and her brother, and then come pick me up later to head out to PI.  I enjoyed a few hours of sleep, food, and relaxing, and soon I was on a bus to PI. 

I met up with Katie and JP outside the Adv. Club, and we were off!  JP wanted to check out the Comedy Club and BET Soundstage, so we did those, as well as a quick circuit of some of the other clubs, and then made our way back to the AC. 

Just in case you haven't read my past trip reports (Shame!  Shame on you!)  I'll give some backstory here.  On our last trip to the AC, Katie and I were joined at our table by Hathaway Brown, who then proceeded to stare at Katie for several minutes, and tickle her with his scarf.  When Samantha called him up on stage, he was very reluctant to leave, and she apologized for making him "leave Trixie and Dixie over there."  We adopted the nicknames, and have used them in e-mails ever since.  So, there was a lot of joking about finding Hathaway tonight and reuniting him with his true love (Katie, aka Trixie.)  Of course, this is WDW, so what happened?  The second we walked into the room, Hathaway (a different one this time) came over to flirt, making us promise to stick together that night as to not "break up the set."  We just finished laughing over our habit of attracting Hathaways when it was time for the Radio Show.  The cast was on the stage getting ready to start, when we noticed that someone looked familiar.

There in the part of Otis T. Wren was our former Hathaway. 

So there we sit, waiting for the show, when Otis goes out into the audience to pick an audience member to participate.  He walks over to our table.  He is looking at me.  Help!  In a self-preservational measure, I point to Katie, and he escorts her up on stage.  Whew- safe!  Well, I am, at least.  Katie, on the other hand, spends the next 10 minutes "Jumping up for Jinkies!"  (We love em!)

Katie and I really like that these photos turned out as a sort of halucinogenic blur, since that's kind of how being at the AC feels.  Especially after a Kungaloosh or two!

After the New Member Induction, it's time for Katie and JP to leave (we insisted that they stick around long enough for JP to be inducted.)  I stuck around for a few minutes afterwards, but it wasn't the same alone, so I too decided to call it a night.  And it wasn't just any night, but my last night.  Tomorrow it will be time to go home.