We're not the only thing on its travels

When we were in Fort Lauderdale, we visited a geocache to drop off a travel bug ("London Skyline Tag"). This is our first foray into the world of geocaching travel bugs and 'trackables', so I want quite sure what to expect. We set it the task of getting home, hoping that someone would pick it up, get on a transAtlantic flight, and drop it off at a geocache in the UK; from whence it would make is way back to our geocache in Milton Country Park.

Someone picked up our travel bug the day after we dropped it off... and then we heard nothing more. Until yesterday, when I received notification that it had been dropped off at a "TB guest house", which I think is a staging post for collection by someone who can help it across the Atlantic.

... so I went to look it up, and discovered that it's done more stops than we have!

[Benjamin:] Discovery Cove

We went to discovery cove to go snorkeling for the first time without any practice. We had one of the largest breakfast ever. When I got into the reef for the first time I came out thinking it was too cold, after looking at creatures through water-logged goggles, and breathing salty water I thought I would never snorkel again. But then mum showed me how to use the mask and snorkel and I went back in, and I really got the hang of it, after doing four laps of the reef I thought I could live down there. Plus I saw all of these creatures:

Then we went to the lazy river which was nothing like a lazy river because it moved so slowly. (The last one was really fast.) Next we had lunch which was gigantic and very filling. 

Next we went to check out the otters, there must have been about 6-8 of them. We also had a look at some Brazilian Marmosets. 

Then me and Dad returned to the reef, while  Mum and Amelie decided to explore the aviary instead. This time we found one of the things we'd been trying to spot, which was the spotted conga eel, which on the whole wasn't that impressive. After that we just stood there stroking rays as they swam by.
They also for some random reason they put some parrots in the park.
Then we went and had a shower before getting a 'I touched a stingray' T-shirt.
The whole way through the day we were having snacks and drinks while watching the dolphins leaping around, just like this:

 

[Not forgetting stroking an Armadillo]

[Amelie:] Discovery Cove

We got up early, we left at 7:15am and we got back at 7:15pm.

We went to Discovery Cove all day.

We had a brilliant breakfast there, there was waffles, yoghurt, croissants, pastries (all of which I ate) plus other things like sausages and potatoes. 

Then we went and had a little explore and put on wetsuits and got a mask and snorkel.

We got to see sting rays, which didn't have their sting, so they are lovely and I'd like to own one. I was a bit scared to go over the deep edge bit but I accidentally drifted over the deep bit without realising it, I had a floaty thing on and was holding Mummy's hand. I saw a spotted eel. I saw loads of different types of fish. We saw sharks in the water but they were behind glass so they couldn't eat me up but it felt like we were swimming with them. 

We saw some dolphins and they were awesome and sometimes they jumped over and sometimes they jumped straight up and back down. They made funny noises, clicking and whistle whistle.

We went into the Lazy river which was pretty lazy, you go under waterfalls, you should try it.

We had some drinks while sitting in seats in the water.

I had lemonade but it was very unusual as you had to lick it like an ice cream to start with, then you could drink it, it was great, I had lots of these.

We also saw otters and Marmosets and stroked an Armadillo.

Mummy also had a couple of birds on her shoulder, pecking her neck rather than the food I was holding.

At the end we got some T-shirts and me and Ben both got 'I stroked a singray' T-shirts.

It was all awesome!

I am so tired I'm doing this blog in bed. Night night.

[Amelie]: Awesome Aquatica

On Saturday we went to Aquatica. Aquatica is a fun water park and we are able to come back here too. 

At the start we saw some dolphins, they seemed quite small as they looked like Orca whales, but they were Commerson dolphins. We had a chat with their keeper about how long they held their breath, which was 10 mins. 

We first went into the wave pool and we played in there for a bit and then we saw another pool that had some flumes that needed inflatables for 2 people. Ben and I found an inflatable, Ben found the first one and I found one when we went back. The person who was not so tall had to go in front, which was me, and Ben was in the back. It was quite hard, as people wanted to cross the flumes and you had to be careful about people being at the bottom.

We also went to the very big flumes, there were lots of stairs to the top and I got quite tired. When it was our turn to go I was a bit nervous and excited.  We went down head first, holding onto a mat. When the man says 'Get Set Go' You push down and off you go. I didn't really know what was happening in the flume tunnel. Mummy and I started on flumes side by side in the middle and ended up apart at either side at the bottom, this is because the flumes wiggled so much.

Then we went to the lazy river, it's pretty lazy. You have something on that helps you float along. There were also currents pushing you along and I noticed people going faster along the edges so I went along the edge as the current was faster there, which was fun. Daddy had to swim fast to catch me. But it was difficult to swim out of the currents. Then we went back to shore, just as everyone was called out of the water, because of a storm coming.

Then we went back to the pool with the double inflatables, where I found an inflatable for Ben and me. The red flume was the shortest but it pushes you faster and the yellow flume was longer. 

Then we went home.

[Benjamin:] Chill Day

After breakfast we went in the pool for three hours. Then we had a early lunch before heading off for Disney Downtown. On the way there we dropped off somewhere and dad spent loads of money on tickets for four Disney theme parks and five days.We went to a dinosaur area were we saw electronic moving dinosaurs we also did a quiz and a hangman.

We saw a fake volcano erupt, lots of giant lego sculptors and a real storm. 

Then we had tea.

[Benjamin:] Boston to Orlando

The next day, Thursday, I got up had breakfast and got in a cab to go to the airport. We dropped off our luggage at baggage drop, and went through security before realising that dad didn't have a boarding pass. So we waited while dad sorted it out he came back with his boarding pass to our relief. Then we boarded the plane after a second/first breakfast. When we we were on board the plane I switched channels until I got to the sport channel then I watched American football for most of the flight and after that I watched football/soccer. Early on in the flight we had a apple juice.

      When we got off the plane we took the tube to baggage claim. Then dad drove to the holiday home. We got in the pool for a hour before having tea.

[Benjamin:] The Aquarium

On Wednesday we went to the Aquarium. The first thing we did was stroke Sting Rays, they felt sort of slippery and slimy.

I am going to tell you that if I named everything we saw and did this blog would go on for ever. But that does not mean that I will not show you any of them. There was only one thing that I and dad saw that mum and Amelie didn't and that was a conga eel. This video and this picture are from the main tank. 

Then I had Macaroni cheese and chicken wrapped in bacon which I did not eat all of. Next we went and got a red socks  baseball cap for twenty dollars! After that we went back to stroke the Rays this time we also stroked the sharks. 

Then we went to watch a seal show and found out we were on the wrong place. But we enjoyed watching the seals fight over a ball.  

Then we went back and played in a water park for a while. Mum and dad decided that our lunch was so big that we were not going to have a proper tea. But a ice-cream, so me, Amelie, mum, dad and Gemma had one ice-cream each.