December 22nd 
By Sahara

We had been at this marina for a while now, and had seen lots of signs for this one aquarium type place- Theater of the Sea-, so we decided to check it out. We got their early in the morning, so not many people were there, and discovered that they have a small cat army hanging out in the place. (sign said do not play with cats.....opps) 
 We saw at least 5 cats, and also many iguanas. Anyway, since this post is supposed to be about the Theater, I shall not go on about the furry animals. We had gotten there just in time to see the dolphin show, so we went their first. I must say, it was the coolest show I have seen. They did many actions I had never seen, and the trainer actually got in the water with them (the dolphins had their own 1 ½ acre lagoon thing). 
 
However before we get to that, I feel like I need to warn everyone reading this that there are some extremely dumb people inhabiting this world. For example, one guy in the stands was asking all these horrible questions, like “do the dolphins breathe air?”  Noooo, they just have their blowhole to make noises, and they keep coming up to the surface just to look at interesting cloud formations. Sad thing is he asked this after he told everyone the dolphins were mammals.  
          
See trainer in the air with Dolphin???(picture below)
 

Okay, on with the show. The dolphins performed all different actions, from jumping through hoops, to jumping 16 feet in the air, doing flips, launching the trainer into the air, swimming right side up, all sorts of things. What dolphins will do for fish….. Actually I think it would be worth smelling of fish if you get to hang out with dolphins all the time. They are amazing animals. 

About the Theater. IN case you were wondering, most of the animals were rescue, or born in the place. They don’t go out and capture animals from the wild to bring them to the aquarium. That’s how they used to do it, many moons ago, but not anymore. One of the dolphins was rescued from a shark attack, and I don’t remember about the other one. I think it was stranded.  
 

Personally, I don’t approve of using the animals for a source of entertainment. However, the dolphins can’t be released back into the wild after being in captivity for so long. IF they are going to be stuck there the rest of their life, they might as well have something to do, as to decrease boredom and to keep active. Shows and training provide that.  

After the dolphin show we went to see the sea lion show. Personally, I liked the dolphins better.. but he sea lion was still cool. It just didn’t provide the same variety as the dolphins did. It could also do many tricks, like catching hoops, balancing a ball, clapping, smiling- it’s actually REALLY scary- and could also tell the difference between jello cubes (they are used to give water to the animals) and ice cubes… while they were in the air being tossed to it. IT would ignore the ice. Sad thing is, the idiot guy I mentioned above was there, and was asking if the sea lion was a mammal. Nooo, they have hair and whiskers and breathe air because they are a fish. Jeeze. 
 

 

 
After this we went and walked around the place. They had crocodiles, (or alligators, I don’t remember), rays, HUGE sea turtles- all rescued, with defects or other-  parrots- they squawked and stared at me-, an owl, some creepy rabbit thing, lots of colorful fish, barracudas, sharks, cats, and iguanas. They last two were just wandering around the park. The iguanas came in different sizes and different colors- orange and green. It was funny because when one of the employees was feeding the parrot fish lettuce, the iguanas would dash in to get a piece, and then run away again with a giant lettuce leaf in its face. Then after the feeder left they would all fight over it.
So, that was our day at the Theater of the Sea. That night we went out for seafood.