There were just too many pictures to share to put them all in one post.
Here’s just a few more.
Riding on the back of an alligator.
And just hanging out.
The behaviours and interactions of the birds and the ‘gators amused and amazed me.
And finally me, doing my alligator /snake charmer impression.
On Saturday the sun was back out. Originally I was supposed to be attending an all day photography seminar at Busch Gardens but thanks to my budget I didn’t get the registration fee into them in time so I found myself a bit more flush but with time on my hands.
Once again I turned to my friendly concierge. They are an absolutely awesome resource. They are familiar with the area and attractions and even have discounts on tickets if you get them through the resort instead of on your own. I had already searched the internet and had some idea what I wanted to do so now I turned to them to set it all up. I handed over my credit card and gave them my available times and what I wanted to do and they handed me back the tickets and brochures and the itinerary. Couldn’t have been easier.
For the morning I wanted to go to Gatorland. I hadn’t been to a place like that in a long time..years actually…and alligator sanctuaries are big on TV right now with shows like Gator Boys and Swamp People and Operation Wild. I plugged in the coordinates and was off.
I didn’t expect to spend a lot of time at Gatorland. After all, they all look-alike except for the individual’s size but I was sure wrong. I could have spent the whole day there.
The first thing you see when you leave your car is a building with a huge mural meant to look like an old post card from Gatorland.
As you turn the corner there a big “gator head” that makes a great photo spot!
Once in you follow board walks between gator pens, big one, little ones, medium-sized ones but what really hit me was the birds!
There were a ton of them and they showed no fear.
They sat on the decks right under the alligator’s noses.
Obviously these alligators are well fed and the birds know it.
They had a small petting zoo and some parrots.
In another enclosure were white alligators.
Each enclosure had educational material posted by the exhibit. In the White Alligator section it was explaining the difference between an Albino alligator and a Leucistic Animal. This was educational for me. I knew about albinos but I had not heard of leucism. I’ll let you look it up. 🙂
In back of the pens and enclosures there was a little train.
Riding that was an additional charge but it was only a couple of dollars so I bit. It was a short ride around the grounds. the narrator pointed out more enclosures with animals like Florida cows and emus. There was a salt water enclosure for some crocodiles and well as more alligator pens. They also have a Zip Line over the farm. Keep your feet up over the alligators!
Back from the train ride I hustled back to the main enclosure for the alligator feeding show.
Here the keepers, I hesitate to call them trainers, were tossing raw meat out to the alligators. The black headed vultures were hopping up and down for scraps. One actually went right up to a big ‘gator and plucked the meat right out of its mouth.
That gator never made a move.
The the keepers tried hand feeding them, teasing them over to the side of a platform and the reaching down as the ‘gator jumped up.
Another way they encouraged the ‘gators to jump was to slide raw chickens down a rope suspended above the water. The ‘gators would swim over and then leap up and grab the chickens. Chomp chomp and it was all over.
I’m sure it sounds gruesome but it was actually pretty interesting. After that show I went back out to one of the many trails that crisscrossed the park. This area was a bird breeding area. The birds love to make their nests near the alligators because the alligators protect them from predators.
Yes they lose a chick here and there that falls out of a nest but the birds seem to feel it’s a good trade-off. It is breeding season now and the Egrets are all fledged out in their breeding plumage. Just beautiful.
By now it was almost noon and time to head to my afternoon appointment in St. Cloud. I wished I’d reserved more time so I could walk the other trails. On my way back I spotted swans and pink flamingos in a pond that seemed to be ‘gator free”.
Some really ugly birds were lined up along the railing. They were big white birds but they had heads that were black and scaly like a vulture. A passing keeper said they were storks. Wow, somehow they didn’t look like I imagined when we used to say the stork brought the baby.
Day 3 dawned with overcast sky’s and light rain showers. It was tempting to just crawl back into bed and sleep-in but my time in Florida is limited so that would be a waste. I was here and opportunity only knocks once (or so “they” say). Joe was at Disney, working, so I was on my own today. I don’t mind that. In fact I told Joe before I came down that I would visit him while I was here. I wanted him to understand that he didn’t have to play host to me the whole week. I had exploring to do and I like doing a lot of that on my own at my own pace.
The concierge at my timeshare said that the cold snap they had the previous week had driven the manatees into the springs for warmth. He suggested I take a drive up to Weeki Wachee State Park. He thought there were some in that spring. Seeing a live manatee in the wild would be an awesome experience.
Weeki Wachee State Park is about an hour north of Orlando. I had my GPS and the roads were good. I drove in and out of bands of rain. It was a scenic ride once I was off the highway. I think most of the drive was on RT 50. There were orange groves both well-tended and abandoned. The well-tended groves were loaded with fruit. As many times as I have been to Florida, I had never seen orange groves so this was really neat.
The weather report said it was supposed to clear so I was hoping the sun would be out by the time I arrived.
I remember hearing about the Weeki Wachee Springs when I was much younger. They had mermaid shows and I thought that would be an awesome job to have when I grew up. I was surprised to find out that they still have those shows at the park. I thought they were a thing of the past like so many other things from the 50’s.
There are a couple of different shows. One show, Fish Tails, gives the history of the mermaids before a pageant style show is presented and the other is based on the Little Mermaid. There is also a reptile show and a boat ride with a conservationist. But I am jumping ahead. Let me walk you through my visit.
Arriving at the entrance to the Park you have a large paved parking area. The entrance is attractive with flags and sculptures of mermaids.
The ticket price includes all the “attractions”, the shows and boat ride I mentioned. Unfortunately the ranger at the window said the manatees were gone now, back out to sea, but she highly recommended the mermaid show.
I was here so I paid my admission and set about exploring.
Inside the park there were paved paths and benches and peacocks…loads of peacocks.
They were pretty but kind of dirty. They liked to sit on the benches too but they left quite large piles of calling cards if you get my drift. If you go, look before you sit.
I took the boat ride first and was surprised to be the only passenger. I guess the threat of rain had put a damper on visitors.
There was a captain and the conservationist and me. The ride is not long but we saw Ibis,
an eagle nest,
Great Blue Heron,
and a Little Blue Heron
, even a domestic Muscovy duck.
Looking into the clear water of the spring fed river I could see fish darting about through the water. They even jumped and splashed occasionally. No wonder the wading birds were hanging out.
The guide said there was an alligator that made it’s home in the spring but that it didn’t come out too much before dusk. On the previous trip down the river they saw white tail deer but they were gone when we got there. Both the captain and the guide recommended that I take a kayak down the river if I had time. Unfortunately I had missed the last trip with a pick up so I would have to come back another day to do that. (I suspect it will have to wait for another trip)
Back on shore I wanted to get some lunch but I would miss the mermaid show if I did that so I headed to the Mermaids instead.
You enter down a flight of stairs and then turn into the theatre itself. The benches are stadium style and surround a curtained wall. While waiting the history of the facility and the mermaids is shown on TV screens above the curtain. And then it was showtime.
The curtains go up and you are looking through a wall of glass like an aquarium but it’s not an aquarium. It’s really a window into the spring and there are the mermaids, young women in mermaid tails, performing synchronized swimming.
Each has a breathing tube which allows them to perform their stunts without surfacing for air. This was a traditional show like they have been doing for years here. Near the end of the show one of the “mermaids” returns from a costume change without her tail but wearing ballet shows. She hands her breathing tube to her spotter and dives to the bottom of the spring at 117 ft holding her breath. It ends with a water ballet sans tails dedicated to patriotism and the American Flag.
It certainly is different and quite enjoyable.
I skipped the reptile show in order to grab a quick lunch at the snack bar, Typical park food…hot dogs, hamburgers, fries. I was the only one there although I did see a few people wandering the grounds while I ate.
After lunch I checked out the stage where the reptile show took place and sure enough, I had missed it. The herpetologist was packing up his stage props and animals but he was willing to let me pet his alligator.
There was another mermaid show but it was getting late. I didn’t want to get stuck in Orlando Rush Hour on my return so I skipped the 2nd show and just wandered the grounds a bit more admiring the peacocks.
As 4 pm approached I headed back to the car for the drive back to the condo.
So no manatees but I bet you didn’t really expect me to find mermaids! 🙂
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImrzMYQLhnY
I may have skipped driving out to Springfield but I didn’t totally blow off the whole day. After taking my little mid-morning nap I settled in to start backing up my photos. That kept me occupied for several hours and when I looked up in the afternoon I was pleased to see the sun shining in.
Nice days will become more and more rare as the season progresses so I wasn’t going to pass it up. I grabbed the camera and headed out to drive south on RT 138. I wanted to see if I could find the farm, I think it might have been a vineyard, that I had noticed when I drove out to Narragansett. Since they call RT 138 “scenic” 138, I thought I’d drive it instead of the highway.
It wasn’t until Somerset that I spotted anything I wanted to stop for.
Off to my left I could see water. I’m not sure whether it was ocean or river. I will have to check a map. I do know the Taunton River runs through Somerset so it could be that. Anyway there was the cutest little boat out there
and a bridge..of course there was a bridge! So I had to stop.
As I approached the bank I was surprised to see a whole flotilla of swans. Quite a few hadn’t reached the “snowy white” stage yet so I can only guess they were still immature even if they were as big as the adults.
I took my pictures and turned around to return to the car when a movement caught my eye. I walked quietly to some trees and brush and there were some sea gulls having a bathing party. I’ve never seen any bunch of birds have quite so much fun in a pool of water. They were splashing and squawking like a bunch of kids having a water fight.
I didn’t find the farm today but I had fun playing “peeping tom” to the bathing seagulls.
