June 13th Seaworld
Today was a blocked day on our DAPs, so we decided to go to Seaworld
We slept in a little later than we should have on this day, considering we had to drive down to San Diego to go to Sea World. We encountered a little bit of traffic at one point on the freeway, so DH got off the freeway and drove along the coastal scenic route. It probably took just as long to drive the scenic areas, but at least it wasnt boring. We got back on the freeway in due time and the rest of the way was clear.
Here are the parking prices at Seaworld:
One of the cool rides!
One of the first things we did when we got in the park was to look for someplace for my DH to eat. He loves to eat and hes lucky hes one of those naturally thin guys who can stuff his face and never seem to gain weight. He wanted BBQ so we ended up eating here:
They had a really good deal going on with the combination plates, so DH and I ordered the combination of smoked brisket, smoked chicken and BBQ ribs.
DS is picky and only wanted brisket. I thought that was unfortunate because the chicken and BBQ was the best and the brisket was so-so.
All the meals came with a side of corn, a bun and French fries. Thats a lot of food for about $8.00 a plate.
DH is a big eater, so he also got the Caesars salad, baked beans and Strawberry cheesecake to go along with it. I got a really good, almost to die for chocolate cake. Yum! DS only wanted chocolate pudding. We all thought that for the price we paid, this food blew away any of the CS food in DLR.
Heres the food porn:
We quickly finished most of our meal (honestly, we couldnt eat it all, it was way too much food!) and because the Dolphin Discovery show was starting soon and was near the restaurant, we went there first. DS and I brought our desserts along and was allowed to bring it in the stands and finish eating while we waited for the show to start.
This show was really good. If you ever go to it, DO NOT sit in the first 10-12 rows or so because its almost guaranteed you will get wet. The Dolphins do a trick in which they go around the pool making huge waves and splashing it out onto the audience members.
Here are some photos from this show:
They go around the whole pool doing this to everyone in the first few rows:
These people were soaked!
I was really glad we werent in those rows and decided right then and there that we would beg, borrow or steal to not have to sit in the lower rows for the remainder of the day!
They brought up a little girl and her family to touch and interact with the wholphin.
Then the trainers sent the wholphin on its way with the little girls mom riding atop the wholphin. (It was actually a trainer, not her mom.) Also, is that a wholphin or is that a whale? Some places have crossbred Dolphins+whales, but I'm not sure about this one...FWIW, I'll call it a wholphin until I hear otherwise. It seemed rather small for a whale.
Suddenly the wholphin dove underwater taking the mom with it everyone gasped!
and then it reemerged and threw the mom up into the air:
They announced that it was actually a trainer and all was right in the world again
Dolphins came out and did their tricks:
2 be continued...
So we got a spot to see the DEP. I haven't seen this show in years! Probably the last time I saw it was way back in 2002 or something like that. So we wait. And we wait. And we wait. And about a half hour after it was supposed to start, some people in our area stood up to leave mentioning that if they didnt they would miss the DL fireworks. They started playing an announcement that the show was unavoidably delayed but that it would be starting soon. I knew we would miss the fireworks, but by the time they started the announcements, I felt that it would be too late for us to get a decent spot for fireworks and that we ran the risk of not making it to fireworks in which case we would end up missing both. So we stayed put. It finally started
Not!
The indoor/dark rides at DL are taken with the D90 and the Sigma 30mm f/1.4 lens. That lens, along with 3200 ISO helps me to get the low light shots hand held. The D90 has a (relatively) newer processor (it just came out in 2008) that allows much higher ISO than my older DSLR and especially P&S cameras. The sensors on the DSLRs are much larger than the P&S cameras so that's why one can use higher ISO with less digital noise. Shucks, there are some DSLRs now than can get ISOs as high as 25,000+ and they don't look noisy at all! I can't afford any of those though, so the D90 works for me and my budget. 
