Sea World

Matt leaves for almost the entire month of June for training in Louisiana. We will miss him everyday. Therefore, we decided that this Memorial Day weekend would be a good time to do a little playing before he has to leave. We planned this trip with our good friends, Erik and Joelle Askerlund, and their five-month-old little girl, Brielle.

Originally, this vacation was going to take place for four days in Corpus Christi, a vacationing hot spot on the Gulf of Mexico. But then we found out that Erik had guard duty Sunday, and would not be able to be gone that long. So we canceled everything and cried a little.

But then I took a shower. And I am a genius in the shower. So I came up with an entirely new plan, that would cost very little and be done before Sunday ever arrived.

Hello, SeaWorld!

There are many perks to being in the military. Perk one: free entrance to many Busch Gardens Amusement Parks, one of which is SeaWorld. Perk two: four day weekend for Memorial Day when most every body else gets three (tanslation: short lines). So Friday morning we caravaned to San Antonio and arrived just in time to enter the park as the gates were opening.

It was awesome! We saw Shamoo, played in the water, rode some great roller coasters, and ate ourselves silly on Dippin' Dots and funnel cake. There was something on every body's level, even Bennett's and Brielle's, and we all had a great time.

In fact, we enjoyed it so much, we decided we would go back the next day, too! (Actually, we decided to go back when we found out the water park was closed until the next day. And it's a pretty great water park.) So we spent the night in a hotel close to the park, and then woke up the next day and did it all again...except this time we did it with two exhausted children and about a zillion other people with a zillion other exhausted children. Luckily, we only stayed until noon, and then hit the road for Mary and Wayne's, where we had a delicious lunch and a good chat before heading back home.

It was pretty fast and furious, but we all really had fun and are already planning on making this a Hargrave Family tradition.


Bennett in the parking lot of SeaWorld. Notice how he is already holding his shoes instead of wearing them? I swear, I don't even know why I try. In fact, I stopped trying after awhile, and when we got to the hotel that night there were little black footprints all over our white towels. This kid is 100% boy.

Brielle, Joelle, Me, and Bennett in front of the SeaWorld gates on Day One.

The first thing we did was go to the Shamoo show. And guess what? Shamoo had a baby! It was so fun to watch her swim around and try to do the same tricks her mom was doing. Cute, cute, cute.

Bennett was pretty involved in the show. He doesn't usually sit still for very long, but he was enthralled the entire forty minutes this show lasted. I really think he liked it, except when people would scream because they got splashed. He didn't like that at all. :)

I have to admit, I have seen this show a few times now and it never seemed that great to me. Watching this with Bennett though was a whole new experience (as I expect Christmas mornings will be) and I may have even teared up a bit. It really is cool watching him experience new things for the first time.

Matt and Erik (and an extremely fat man) walking back to the strollers after seeing Shamoo.

After lunch (which we ate at a restaurant inside the park...something I never thought I would do), we took the little guys to cool off in Shamoo's Happy Harbor, which is like a little splash park. As mentioned above, the main water park was not open on this day, so this tiny area was crammed with more people than should ever be allowed in one place.

It was here, in the midst of a tumultuous mob scene, that Bennett decided he no longer required the assistance of an adult to move about. He toddled off with impressive speeds though holes and crowds of people nobody over three-feet tall could ever hope to fit through. Surprisingly, he loved all the people, and would giggle with delight every time a rampid child would catapult around a corner and smash him to the ground. We are only lucky he made it out of there alive.

The water and sun took a lot out of Bennett. The green thing is a fan that squirts water, and it saved our lives on this ridiculously hot and humid day.

Dippin' Dots in a Shamoo bowl. the lady gave me so much, I didn't even finish them all. (Something else I never thought I would do.)

While Bennett slept, Joelle and I ate ice cream (above) and Matt and Erik rode some of the bigger rides. Here they are going up...

And here they are coming down, much to the delight of hundreds of middle school children wanting to get wet at the bottom. Seriously, there must have been at least five different schools here on this day. Can I just say that I am so glad to be out of that awkward stage of life?

When Bennett woke up we went to the arcade and tried our hands at whack-a-mole, the ring toss, and that one game where you hit the scale on the bottom and try to make the weight reach the bell at the top (what do you call that?). Anyway, Bennett inherited several stuffed animals that followed us around the rest of the day and will probably end up in the bottom of his toy box now that we are home.

We love amusement park souvenir's.

After a few rounds of roller coasters for everybody, we called it a day and found our hotel. That night we ate some Chinese food and passed out from exhaustion. It was a good day.

The next day we arrived at the park early and spent a good few hours doing some of the things we hadn't gotten to do the day before.

Matt and Bennett at the park, day two.

One of the things we did that we hadn't done previously was to watch the Sea Lions get fed. These are remarkably awkward animals that are fascinating, due to the fact that they are so remarkably awkward. Bennett could not keep his eyes off of them, which is why he is not looking in even one of the pictures we took here.

THIS WAS MY FAVORITE PART!!! After the Sea Lions we went to see the dolphins and it just happened to be during feeding time. So we droped two-thirds of Matt's paycheck on dead fish and joined the crowds around the pool. It was SO cool!

Joelle and Brielle feeding the dolphin.

Matt and Bennett feeding the same dolphin. These guys are well fed.

We still had a little time to kill before the water park opened, so we stopped in at this huge aquarium place. Everytime a big fish, or especially sharks, would swim past, Bennett would point and say "OOOooohhh!" or "Woooow." What a funny boy.

"OOOooohhh!"

The water park of SeaWorld finally opened at 11:00, and we entered with a throng of hot and sweaty tourists while both Bennett and Brielle screamed. And I thought to myself, "Is this fun?" And no, it was not fun for a little while. Bennett was slap-tired and I was exhausted, and the "lazy river" we tried going on as a family was anything but. We were seriously about to just leave, when we stopped by the kiddie pool and suddenly life was back to its normal happy self.

Thank goodness for shallow water! Bennett played and played in this pool and I was happy to watch and help when needed. Matt and Erik did a few of the big slides, and by the time we left we had totally forgotten the sheer horribleness of the first few minutes. Bennett was out before we even got to the car, and he slept like a dead man all the way to his Maimie and Pop's.

We had a great lunch and it was lots of fun getting to see Bekah and Nathan and Mary and Wayne again. By the time we left for home we were fat and happy.

We love this bunch!

Family vacations are the best. :)