Today was the big day as far as dolphins are concerned. We went
with 8 others to Vallarta Adventures. It’s a great place. I was impressed by
their care of the dolphins and sea lions.
Our dolphin
was a 35 year old female, 9 feet long weighing 800 pounds. She eats 35 pounds
of fish a day. Her 2 year old daughter was in the tank with us. She can have
more children but she is on birth control as there is a limit to how many
dolphins they can support.
There is one alpha male in the group and one baby
male. I don’t know what they will do with him but they can’t have more than one
adult male because they fight.
We spent
several minutes petting the dolphins. They have soft skin. It is all marked up
as they bite each other. Their skin regenerates every day, though, so it’s not
a problem. Our dolphin loves to be petted. She especially enjoys being petted
on the tummy and did not want us to stop.
Her baby loves it, too. She has a
pink belly which is even softer.
Dolphins have
a “midwife” when they are in the wild so the park provides an experienced
female to stay with the mother and take the baby to the surface after birth.
There is a video of this process on the Internet that I plan to watch when I
get home.
For $50 more,
I could have had a dolphin pull me through the water while I held onto her fins.
I wish I had done it now. I didn’t know that it would be so much fun until I
saw it.
Bill didn’t
want to get into the tank so he took pictures and movies. I will post them when
I get home. I really enjoyed the whole experience and would do it again
anytime.
My throat
hurts a little today so I think I may be catching his cold. He says it is mild,
as colds go.
Last night,
we saw a comedian, Elliot Maxx. He sang silly songs about cruising including
“The S.S. Geritol” which describes our cruise perfectly.
This morning
I went to a lecture on the Aztecs. I read the book 1491 so I was up to
date on Aztecs already. I still enjoyed it.
Thursday, we
are taking a major trip to see Colonial Antigua which is a World Heritage Site.
We signed up with a group from Cruise Critic.
