Georgia's Groupon had a great deal for a family to go swim with the Manatees in the wild. The only place to do this is at Crystal River, Florida, and since it was just a few hours drive from our new home, we decided what better chance than now to go and swim with a wild manatee.
We prepared with a homeschool science unit study on manatees, learning all about this wonderful mammal that has no predators, though humans are the cruelest to them because speed boats really do kill several of them a year. They are literally gentle beasts that munch on sea grass all year round and just float around and rest and just have a very "type B" personality. What's not to like about these low-key creations.
We headed down to the bay and joined a group of twenty people who just wanted to sit on the glass bottom boat and see the fish from the boat. Just five of us: Paxton, Lisa, and Hope, and a couple, wanted to brave the cold waters to check out those sea cows up close and in person.
We boated around for a while, quite nervous that we wouldn't see those gentle creatures, as the spring usually sends them out to sea. The only real time to pet these wild creatures is between November and March when it's cold outside because the manatees like to swim close to Crystal River where natural hot springs bring them in to congregate around.
In this picture, the manatees look like little sardines packing it in, trying to stay warm close to the hot spring. Each manatee is close to 1000 pounds, so that's a lot of poundage near that spring. The white lines are there to protect the manatees so that humans can't just go in willy nilly and bother the manatee's personal space.
We, however, went when most of the manatees decided it was too hot and wanted to float away to the oceans. After a long time searching and searching, we actually spotted a dozen other snorkelers who shouted that they found a mom and calf swimming in the brackish waters, not the nice crystal water areas where the springs are. We REALLY wanted to see the manatees, so off into the cold brackish waters to search for Barbara manatee and her calf.
We swam and swam, looking at the different sand bars here and there in the murky green waters where the sun filtered through, making the swimming environment a bit creepy. Still, we pressed on and headed to where all of the snorkelers were looking for the elusive manatee.
Lisa was holding Hope's hand while we were snorkeling. We both saw a sand bar underneath us suddenly turn and appear closer and closer to us. Lisa told Hope to stop kicking and just float. The sand bar was the momma manatee, coming straight up to us. We had no time to get out of its way, so we just gently put our hands out and pet the humongous sand bar looking creature. The manatee felt like a pig, of all things. We were expecting it to be slick like a dolphin, but nope. It had hairy, prickly, tough skin. And it moved like a slow, sluggish, happy creature that had no where it really wanted to go. The calf (which was like 500 pounds) moved up to us and stuck its face in our faces. It's eyes were so gentle, kind of like a gentle dog's eyes. We just smiled inside our snorkels and said "hi cutey". It was surreal to be able to be so close to such large gentle creatures and touch them. And just like that, they descended into the deeper murky parts of the bay and disappeared.
Paxton took a bunch of pictures, but because the water was too murky, all we got were green pictures of fuzziness. Pure fuzziness. Guess you had to be there to experience it.
We swam around a bit more and saw the manatees chomping on the sea grass and just enjoying themselves while the dozen or so swimmers watched them.
I think Heaven will be like that, except, we hopefully won't need snorkeling gear so we can just go and swim with them.
