Arctic Adventure

Recently, I had dinner with my nieces, nephew, and sister-in-law. I was complaining how cold it had become when Jess reminded me that it wasn’t “nearly as cold as our Artic Adventure” which reminded me of our fun trip…

As you may have read in previous blog posts, my sister-in-law and I took my nieces, Ella and Jess, to Sea World in Florida a few months ago. On our first day at the park, it poured rain. There was still a lot to see so we bought slickers and headed out anyway. It was nice because there were no lines anywhere and few people crazy enough to trudge through ankle deep puddles on a random Thursday but there we were. By mid afternoon, we needed to escape the downpour so we headed over to the Arctic Adventure exhibit.

Little Jess was just the right height to get onto the “helicopter” ride that would take us to the polar bears and ice hut. We explained the ride, and buckled in. The “pilot” told us to keep our items on our laps as it may be a bumpy ride. Jess commented, “I like keeping my backpack on my lap, better than when we flew in the plane down to Florida. This way, if I want to color on the trip, it is right here.” I started to think that maybe Jess didn’t understand the concept of this “helicopter” ride. I looked over at Ella who heard Jess’s comment, and being older and wiser, Ella shrugged her shoulders and rolled her eyes. The “helicopter” jolted us in our seats, tossed and turned. Jess whispered, “Is this bumpiness normal?” I explained that it was. “Oh good,” she says, “it is kind of fun.” People around us just smiled.

Then images of the frozen tundra started whirling by us on large screens and cool air swirled at our feet. Jess started to look around frantically. She questioned, “Do you think we will see Santa? I mean, I know he is really busy making toys but it would be neat to at least see him and his house.” Seriously, you can’t make this stuff up. To stinking cute.

Suddenly, the “helicopter” lands and Jess declares, “humph, I thought the trip to the North Pole would be longer than our trip to Florida. Who knew Santa lived so close?” People chucked and so did big sister Ella who whispered in my ear, “she doesn’t get that it’s not real but that’s ok.” Well bat-ear-Jess heard Ella declare the ride fake just as we stepped into the exhibit. Jess touched an iceberg and pointed at a large, very real polar bear, and argued, “oh yea, this is ice and that’s a polar bear. It could eat your head. That is for real?!?!”

No arguing with that logic.