SWIMMING WITH BOTTLENOSE DOLPHINS

Their skin was as hard as fully pumped car tires. It was also very smooth. Their bodies were warm even under the 18 degrees sea water, showing the temperature of a living being. The semi pool-slash-lagoon was around 6 meters deep, which was the borderline of my sea-depth phobia because the water was already deep coloured, but we could still see the bottom. Although, not having goggles kinda helped preventing my nervous feeling to come out. There were 9 peoples in the water, including me and Dennis and 2 trainers, together with 2 dolphins named Kayena and Annie.

It was a sunny day in Curacao, at the Dolphin Academy. We were very excited for this experience and had been looking forward to it ~ swimming with dolphins! I always have this image of dolphins being a mythological creature (blaming comic books I read when I was little) the ones that will help people on the sea, smart and kind mammals living in deep ocean. In this place, we could observe and interact with trained bottlenose dolphins in both spacious enclosures and the open sea — which they claimed that Dolphins can easily go back to the open sea if they wanted to.

Dolphin Academy hopes to motivate its guests to a personal contribution for a better living environment for dolphins and therefore gives them the message: ‘If mankind continues to shroud dolphins in myth and mysticism…we risk losing them. Only by seeking the true nature of our fellow creatures, can we hope to protect them.’

The program/session that we chose is called “Dolphin Swim”, which means we would be swimming with them on the lagoon. They also have several programs such as diving with dolphins, and open sea exploration with dolphins.

After the registration, we were led to the dolphin show. The stage is a semi-pool because it is connected to the ocean, gated by a 1 meter tall rock barriers where the dolphin has access to swim to the open ocean if they want to. When we arrived, the spectator seats were full already — mostly with kids. I was as excited as them, since the closing they are showing dolphins jumping and doing attractions accompanied by Strangers Like Me song by Phil Collins. This, with open sea as the back drop was surreal. I think I cried a little bit, counting my blessings.

After the show, we were led to the room to change to our swimsuits. Then we did a fitting for snorkelling shoes. We were then asked to go to the same place where the dolphin show was held, and there we would have our swimming session. The trainers briefed us about what to do and not to do, in addition they also taught us basic signals for interacting with the dolphins.

I had mixed feelings when I got into the lagoon. I always had this uncomfortable feeling when I get into salt water, so I hung onto Dennis at the very beginning. The dolphins were swimming close by, and we were allowed to pet them slowly. In turns we were wearing goggles and were able to swim/dive in with them. I didn’t do it of course, but I saw the dolphins from close by and swam on the surface with them. They had the most beautiful, understanding eyes, that looked deep and it feels that they would like to speak to us. It feels so emotional, and I felt privileged to be able to interact with this brilliant creature. We were practicing signals that we were taught about few minutes before. I chose to have a dolphin kiss, and dancing with me. Additional sweetest memories in our sweet honeymoon, we were able to signal the dolphins to kiss together with me and Dennis.

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More Information

Where: Dolphin Academy Curacao
Duration: 30 minutes swimming, up to 90 minutes for the whole program
Bring: swimming suit, goggles, and towel to drying up