Beluga Whale Encounter

We spent our second day in San Antonio at Sea World.  Before entering that park, though, we had reservations to do the beluga whale swim at Discovery Point which is the animal interaction branch of Sea World San Antonio.  Swimming with beluga whales was a really big deal for Olivia.  The beluga is her favorite animal in the world.  I cannot tell you how excited she was when she found out that she was going to get to meet one.

 We checked in to Discovery Point and were fitted with long sleeve wet suites.  The beluga lives in the Arctic, and so the water in their tank is cold- we're talking 50 degrees.  After changing, we boarded a bus and were driven to beluga stadium.  Sea World San Antonio has 10 beluga whales- including two under a year old.  One of these young males is Tyonek- the whale who was famously rescued in Alaska last year.  The young belugas do not participate in any of the shows at Sea World and are not located in a viewing area where the public can see them.  But guess who did get to see Tyonek.  We did!  They were feeding him when we arrived so we got a glimpse of him- no pictures though because we were not allowed to bring our cameras (we purchased the ones that you see).  Fun fact:  baby belugas are gray so that they blend in with their mother's shadow when they swim.

 We got to interact with two belugas- Natasha and Imaq.  Natasha was first, and she was a sweet old girl.  We got to rub her belly, touch her melon, and feed her fish.  We also learned some commands and interacted with her that way.  While we were doing this, the trainer was giving us all kinds of interesting information about belugas.  We were the only ones with her, so we had plenty of opportunities to have our questions answered.

After Natasha left, we got to meet Imaq.  He has a big ol' boy, but was very loving.  We each had the chance to love on Imaq.  We couldn't really "swim" with the belugas like we did with the dolphins because they do not have a dorsal fin, so there is not much to grab on to.  Instead, we did a back float with the beluga. 

We had such a good interaction with the belugas and hated to say good-bye.  This was definitely a magical experience.