Seal Kisses and Scary Sharks (05/12/04)
Last updated 08/02/04
Underwater World in Mooloolaba,
Queensland is a giant aquarium that offers visitors the chance to hold sea urchin
and starfish, get kissed by a seal, and get inches away from sharks and manta
rays. You see they've got this underwater tunnel made of 6-inch thick acrylic
where you are surrounded by all sorts of marine life (fish of various sizes including
several shark species and large sting rays) as you walk around. The customer
service at Underwater World rocks! We ended up paying for the Seal Encounter
adventure -- you get to go backstage and see the seals and get to shake hands
with them and even get kissed by them. Of course they take pictures during this
event and offer to sell them to you at a pretty expensive rate (15 bucks per
picture or something like that). I asked if we could get the pictures on CD (they
used a digital camera so it should've been easy for them),
and it turned out that we could get all the pictures on CD for $10! Unfortunately
they were having probs with their automated cd burning system (Fuji software
is not the most reliable apparently), so they told us that they'd just mail us
the CD. They didn't charge us anything, and guess what.. they actually sent the
pictures! In fact, not only did they send us a CD with the pictures (international
mail at that), but they also threw in some glossy prints -- all for free. In
my book that's
great customer service... Oh yeah, one point about the seals: they may
be
cute, but they're pretty stinky!
Pictures
