I took a random spur of the moment trip to Aquatica on friday! I don't have pictures because I didn't have time to buy a water camera and didn't want to leave my good one unattended on a towel. I guess I will write the review as a mini TR for the sake of organization.
9am-- We leave for Aquatica, aproximately 10 minutes away from home. The park has been reaching capacity everyday and I figured this would give us plenty of time for the 10am opening. WRONG! We hit MAJOR traffic at the intersection of Central Florida Pky. and Idrive (right by the Sea World, Discovery Cove entrance.) We bearly moved AT ALL for the next hour
. Later, when we got to the entrance, we realized there were policemen directing traffic and they would let in three cars from our direction and then about 30 from the other way.
We turned in at about 10:15 and were in the final five cars allowed in (so lucky
) Once you do turn in, there are only two lanes. One lane says 'taxi's, buses, dropoff' so everyone in this lane is trying to merge into the other lane which majorly slows everything down and irritates alot of people. In actuality, BOTH lanes lead to general parking so all this merging is unnecessary and everyone has to divide back into two lanes. The parking lot is TINY! I have seen bigger at area Lowes' or even Walmarts. I talked to a security guy for a few minutes and he admitted that the park capacity is only 7,500. This is in contrast to the 33,000 that Sea World is permitted. Also, unlike at Disney, when capacity is reached, the park is closed for the day. It doesnt matter how many people leave, no one else is coming in. IF you have already purchased tickets, you may park at Seaworld and take a shuttle bus over but this is super annoying and rather time consuming according to the lady I talked to who did it. Anyway, by this point it is nearly eleven and I am so tired and frusturated that I don't even want to go in. My friend keeps pointing out how we are lucky to be in at all and that we should take advantage, so we do.