A Beautiful Day Out

Last month, hubby found a good deal on Spreets - $39 for entry to Seaworld and a sunset cruise on a luxury boat. This was quite a bargain as the usual price of such a package would be almost $70.

I have not been to Seaworld and hence I was quite excited about this trip. We thought of bringing one of our nieces along but on hindsight, it was good that we did not so we could enjoy this 'date'. We were so thankful for the beautiful weather - sunny but not too hot. We brought along food and water that lasts us for morning tea, lunch and afternoon tea (which brought us lots of savings as the food sold at the park was exorbitantly priced.) We also maximised our time by planning to attend most of the shows and feeding times that were available.

There were some rides, for kids and adults, if you want some adrenaline rush. We ride on the slower monorail and cable cars and the faster Jet Rescue and Viking's Revenge water flume ride. I have not gone for any adrenaline-pumping rides for ages and these adventure made me feel both young (screaming in excitement) and old (body reflexes have declined and more tensed muscles).

I get to see my favourite penguins and dolphins. I love to see the docile bottlenose dolphins swimming and jumping at the show. I took a number of videos on my mobile phone, excited to play back to show my nieces. With the penguins, that was the first that I got to see them much closer to me, even though they are behind the glass that separates us. The king penguins live in a cold climate and hence had to be in the cold enclosure at the newish Penguin Encounter exhibit. We got to see another species of smaller fairy penguins which is able to live in the atmospheric temperature of the park and found along the shorelines of Australia and New Zealand. We saw the park rangers fed these little ones with little fishes.

Another interesting animal was the polar bear. We walked pass the above ground exhibit once and did not see any bear. On our second time through, we realised we could walk down to the ground level and underwater platforms. We finally got to see the big fuzzy polar bear walking around and eventually jumping into the water from a huge high rock. At the underwater platform, we saw it swim around and at one stage, picked up a plastic bottle floating on the water and putting it onto its mouth with its 2 paws, just like a baby holding a bottle to drink milk. That was a treat to be able to view the bear in action. Sometimes, I wonder if the bear knew that many people are observing it and hence was 'showing off' and posing for photos (You can see in one of the photos above, the bear was lying half in water and above water after its swim).

The 1.5-hour sunset cruise was a great bonus to end our time at Seaworld. We went on board a 3-storey boat, laden with luxurious leather cushion seats. I felt like sitting indoor and sleep in the comfort of the cosy place but it would be a waste of my time :p All guests were served with a glass of champagne or orange juice. You guessed it, this was a great photo opportunity for many as we cruise towards the end of the spit and a little of South Stradbroke Island. A unexpected treat awaits us when the captain of the boat told us that dolphins were sighted a short distance away. As you can imagine the excitement of everyone on board, many streamed towards one side of the boat to look out for them. For a good 20 minutes or so, we sighted many occasions of their tails and water squirts. Sometimes, we would see a mother and child team (2 tails are sighted together). It was a really relaxing time as the sun sets and the night draws closer.

We had no concrete plans for dinner. Thanks to hubby's Urban Spoon application on his phone, we found Maruya, a Japanese eatery at Southport which serves fairly good Japanese food for quite a good affordable price. I love Japanese food and would gladly eat it anytime. Maruya did not disappoint us. Their food was really decent, both in quality and cost. We were so glad to find this place and were thankful as that rounded up the entire day of the little blessings and enjoyment for the day. I reckon this is one of our best date - thank God for such a blessing :)