Today we visited the Clearwater Marine Aquarium. This is the animal hospital featured in the movie Dolphin Tale, which was about Winter the dolphin who lost her tail due to a crab trap accident and had a prosthetic one made for her. We had made a special trip to the west coast of Florida just to see this aquarium and we were all really excited to see Winter and her friends Panama and Rufus in person.
Winter with her buddy Panama behind her
Winter getting a little love from her physical therapist
Because Winter can swim just fine without her prosthetic tail and because it's stressful and uncomfortable for her to wear it all the time, she only wears it a couple of times a day during physical therapy sessions to help develop her muscles and take the strain off her spine. K was excited to hear that Winter is the same age she is (7), and we found out that the Clearwater Marine Hospital rescued her when she was only a few months old.
This aquarium is a working hospital where their mission is: Rescue/Rehab/Release. That is their goal for every animal they come in contact with and you can see the passion they have for these animals and their desire to protect them and help them recover from their injuries. Some animals, like Winter, cannot be released back into the wild and become permanent residents of the aquarium where they serve as educational tools about what can happen to wild animals when humans aren't careful.
One turtle was there because he was hit by a boat. Apparently when turtles are hit by boats after they have just taken a big breath of air, the air can be forced out of their lungs and into their body cavities where it becomes trapped permanently. This turtle is a permanent resident of the aquarium because of his "bubble butt" which makes it impossible for him to fully submerge to get food or escape from predators.
The aquarium is also home to many other turtles, a few other dolphins, and several otters. The girls were especially excited to meet Rufus, the pelican from the movie, but they weren't excpecting to find out that the role of Rufus was actually played by two different birds, a boy and a girl, who each were trained for different types of behaviors. One is more social and did the flying and interactive scenes, and the other was more easily trained and did the walking scenes and the ones that required specific movements (like walking down the hallways following the kids). We also were surprised to find out that these were actually African pelicans and look absolutely nothing like the small brown pelicans they have here in Florida.
A&K took a quick spin in the hurricane simulator.
And then they each took turns feeding fish to the giant stingrays. C was not at all interested in sticking her hand in the water with these creatures, and A & K were defnitely hesitant of the frantic, speeding approach the rays had. The powerful suction of their mouths scared A the first time, but she eventually was willing to give it another go.
The aquarium had a separate location that we didn't make it to that had more than 100 props and scenes from the movie. It was really fun to see all the things at the aquarium that had been in the film. They had many of the items labeled as Props and had large wooden signboards in several locations showing what movie scenes had been filmed there. It was like being on a movie set and at an aquarium at the same time!
One of Winter's actual prosthetic tails. She's had more than a dozen as she continues to grow and they make improvements to the design.
As the aquarium closed for the day, we got ready to head out on our boat ride. For about $12 more than admission prices, we bought a trip on a 1 1/2 hour boat ride. I just happened to see a sign when we bought our tickets and I'm so glad I asked about it! There were only 10 other people on the boat with us, including aquarium volunteers, so it was nearly empty and it was wonderful! They took us out in the Clearwater estuary (a mix of fresh and salt water from rivers and springs combined with the Gulf of Mexico) and let us ride along as they did their research in the bay.
Barrier island that separated us from the Gulf of Mexico
They had seen a juvenile pelican earlier in the day that looked like it had some string around its wing so they had grabbed a travel kennel and we headed to the docks to see if we could find it.
Nope, not that one. He looks ok :)
We couldn't find him, but after we left the dock area we actually saw some dolphins in the water! They were jumping out, but my timing wasn't so good...
As the boat drove on, the driver told us a little bit about what we were seeing.
the birds on Bird Island
The home of the man who invented the amphibious vehicle back in the 1930s
A little while later the boat stopped again and they prepared the nets. The purpose of this boat trip was actually to do a deep-water pull to see what condition the sea life was in and what was living out here. As part of their research in the area, they're allowed to pull for 20 minutes a day so they do it in 3 minute segments several times a day at both shallow and deep levels. We found out later that 'deep' meant about 7 feet. Apparently, the whole bay is only about 10-12 feet deep at its deepest point with many sandbars and sea beds in the middle of the water that were mere inches deep.
When they finished dragging the net, they pulled it on to the boat and emptied the contents into a cooler. Once they were sure they didn't have anything that needed to be put back immediately, we headed out for the only Spoil Island that humans are allowed to go on. There are 15 of these islands out there but no one is allowed on the other 14 as they are protected sanctuaries and there is a big fine for anyone who sets foot on them. This island was called One-Tree Island (for obvious reasons) and the boat ran ashore and let us out to look around for seashells while they inspected, documented, and separated out the creatures they had pulled up in the net.
One-Tree Island
the girls on the island
checking out what the net pulled in
Once we were back on the boat they brought the creatures they had found around to all of us so we could see them. They had a crab, a shrimp, an urchin, a pufferfish, and a big assortment of other fish to show us. On the way back we saw a couple more dolphins way off in the distance.
The aquarium was closed and locked up for the night by the time we got back, so we just headed for our car and started driving north back towards Hwy 10, which would be our route back home. I had planned to camp for the night at Fort Walton Beach, but it was just way too far away after getting such a late start, and the really humid air made me worried that the tent might mold since we would have no way of drying it out down here. We ended up making it to Tallahassee, and were greeted by our very first gecko at our hotel room.
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