Jessica, Bob and Zoe

On our last day in Florida I spent about about an hour and a half swimming with dolphins, the whole point of our trip.  For half an hour I did the structured swim, where the trainer tells the dolphin to do specific behaviors with you.  I was with another girl, from England, with three dolphins - a mom, dad and ten month old baby.  The baby didn't do any of the behaviors, except for jumping, she just hung out next to her mom.  But she was awfully cute! The time went by MUCH faster than I'd remembered, but it was a lot of fun.  The dolphins were really energetic and seemed to be having lots of fun.  So here are some of my favorite pictures!

Belly rubs are always fun

I love getting dolphin kisses!  It was actually hard staying next to him

(I think this was Bob), there were other dolphins swimming and making

waves and I had to really work to stay next to him.

This was the funniest part, the foot push.  They each put their nose on one of my feet

and pushed me backwards.  When they stopped the trainer said she'd been working

with them on pushing people farther, so she wanted me to put my feet up again and

they would come back and push me again..........

As you can see, one dolphin got to me first and started pushing, before

the other one got there, so I started going in a circle.......

So here comes the other dolphin, trying to reach my foot........

I tried so hard to help them out, but one dolphin was still pushing

and the other dolphin was almost in front, so I'm bending my knee trying to

get my foot on his/her nose.  It was quite funny and the trainer finally

let us give up!

Jessica dancing with me!

Bob bringing me a hoop.

Poor Jessica, I had a lot of trouble holding up a pretty heavy

hoop while treading water.  I was supposed to hold it OUT of the

water so that she could jump UP and through it, instead she had to

kind of jump vertically, poor thing.  She was a good sport about it, though.

This was my favorite part, getting kissed by both dolphins, I got to

pet their chins while they were there.  I loved it.

I got a face FULL of saltwater as they pulled me, they pulled so fast!

I was amazed they didn't crash me into the wall.

Here's the little baby, Zoe, jumping with her parents.  Obviously she can't

jump as high as them yet, but it was very cute to see them all jump together.