GATORLAND!
We rode the alligators! That’s right, you read that right. We hopped on their backs and rode around.
What, you didn’t believe me?
OK, maybe we didn’t ride them around the park, but we sat on them. And, they wiggled almost like we were riding them.
But, I get ahead of myself.
It was another warm (74F) and sunny day in Florida.
Today we went to Gatorland!
We were tired of hearing there were so many gators around without ever seeing them. As this is a place that breeds them and such we figured it was a good place to see them.
The signs there are funny.
This is not my wife feeding some random children to a giant alligator.
Nor is this me keeping the mouth open so the kids can escape.
Once safe, my wife and cousins joined me at the gator mouth.
I can’t lie. There are a lot of gators at Gatorland.
What I wonder most, who puts out those wreaths?
The first show was the folks who work there trying to taunt the alligators out of the water with chicken.
I’m told hardly any of the people get bit.
Much like a museum where both my wife and I worked in the past, Gatorland has a train.
It seemed much like that one we had worked with before, so we did not go on it.
I did worry for a bit that mariness might end up recreating old comedy moves getting stuck on the tracks.
Fortunately that was not a problem.
Gatorland is known for its white alligators that are NOT albinos.
I guess they’re OK. Like most of the gators there, they just sit there. But, it is different.
They have lots of other animals there too. My wife wen in for the “feed the budgie” time.
You can get a lot of budgies with a stick covered in bird seed.
But, one excited child can create a budgie stampede.
(Flightede? Featherede? Who knows?)
We bought the “Grunt Pack” tickets that included all sorts of extras. One of which was a bunch of turkey hot dogs for each of us to feed too the alligators.
So, we picked this lot as looking likely.
The birds there get quite excited when food gets thrown around and do not realize it is intended for anything other then them.
Feeding the alligators seemed to make my wife quite happy.
My wife also got some bird chow and fed some of the birds.
She seemed to like that well enough, but it didn’t make her smile like feeding gators.
There was what looked like a pool cue floating in with the alligators.
Do alligators play pool? Do the birds? No one seems to know. And, no one seemed all that excited to remove the stick just in case they were going to play a game later.
Then, it was off to the gator wrestling show. It starts with them hauling a gator out of the water onto the sand and asking audience members if they want to sit on it.
This was also included in the Grunt Pack tickets, so we got in line.
What the photos of us on the gator don’t show is that they tape the gator’s mouth shut and the handler is right there just out of shot.
But, we did go out and sit on the alligator. It didn’t seem to mind a whole lot and quite a few folks did it.
They brought up one little girl and told her she had to fish her own gator out of the water. She said “OK” and headed towards them.
I guess little girls who grow up in Florida don’t have the fear of gators some of the rest of us do. But, they stopped her and explained it was a joke and she didn’t need to pull on out by the tail by herself.
Then, the handlers did stupid gator tricks.
I mean STUPID gator tricks.
I know, you’re thinking “they must make sure that is safe, right?”
Well, over in the breeding pond is a gator they retired after he bit 4 handlers in less then 6 months.
So, I’m just as glad we didn’t get “lucky” and see that.
There is a big breeding pond where they put in most of the gators.
They also take in gators from all over Florida who live in golf courses or similar places people don’t want them. So, it is nice they have an option other then killing the gators.
And, there are a lot of them there.
The rest of the area is gator breeding and zoo. They really do have a lot more then just gators there.
They also have several types of crocodiles. But, they don’t try those gator tricks with them.
After Gatorland we ended up back at my cousin’s place where we watched the night lights of Orlando and my wife made several dozen more cookies.
It was an interesting day and we had a good time.
I had never touched a gator before, much less sat on one. It is an interesting experience.