Dolphin World Blog

Hi there,

Yesterday, Mark, my good dive buddy and church friend, and I, went scuba diving off Hollywood Beach, FL. It was finally a beautiful day, previously, we had tremendous winds and the ocean had high seas for about a week. We were not sure how the conditions would be on the way out to the ocean on Mark’s boat. We were totally blessed because the visability was really amazing, 50 – 100 feet, and the seas were very calm, 1 – 2 foot chop.

Mark getting his gear together for the dive

John, happy he is not sea sick and loving the day of diving!

Since I have dove the Ft. Lauderdale area for many years, I have always had the desire to run into a school of wild dolphins out there and being able to swim around with them. You do feel like a dolphin when you scuba dive. At least that’s what I think. Again this was another day, I was wondering if this would be the eventful day. Unfortunately, again nothing, we dove in 50 + feet the first dive and 20+ feet on the second dive.

I know, you will see tons of wild dolphins in the Florida Keys. We sell a Key West Wild Dolphin adventure, which is a lots of fun. Also, you see lot of wild dolphins on the West Coast of Florida. A company in Naples, Florida, does a great job finding wild dolphins over there, Naples Water Tours.

For some reason, Ft. Lauderdale does not attract dolphins. I heard the water is too deep and not a good fishing spot for the dolphins, darn.

My questions to you scuba divers, has anyone had an encounter with wild dolphins while scuba diving. Please send me that story, I would love to hear about it. I need some hope that I will have a chance to swim with the dolphin while scuba diving in the Ft. Lauderale area.

God Bless,
John

Hi all,

I thought you would enjoy the photographs I have from my trip to Anguilla and Tortola.

Day 1 was the day I got picked up from the Airport by my Uncle. After our greeting, we immediately went to the beach. Not sure what to expect, the beach was a WOW. I loved it and it was a perfect beginning to decompress from my flight over to this island paradise. Anguilla has been voted some of the best beaches in the world and I can see why!!

Day 2 was the day my Aunt and Uncle, their friends, and I went to swim with the dolphins in Anguilla. We had a blast and I was surprised how much my Uncle loved it. He had a smile on his face I will never forget.

Day 3, we went and meet some American friend’s of my Aunt and Uncle who own a home on the island. We had lunch at a nice beachside restaurant and went to visit thier home also. All I can say, I could live in Anguilla.

Day 4, I traveled to Tortola for the day to have a look at the dolphin facility there. Tortola was lovely, nice size mountains and beaches. Cruise ships come into port here. You will see that the background to this facility was lush and green where Anguilla is on a hillside over looking the ocean.

Day 5, we went sailing with Chocolat Sailing excursion out of Sandy Ground, Anguilla. Captain Roland showed us a great time, snorkeling, beaches, lunch, and of coarse sailing. A great finish to a fun trip.

Also, I need to send out my love to my Aunt and Uncle who were so kind to open their room to me and it was great to spend time with them (hopefully I did not snore at all ). It has been years since I have done that with them. In our busy lives, we kind of forgot of our families and hopefully this experience will rekindle others to spend some QT with theirs.

Here are the photos:
Day 1 – Anguilla Beaches
Day 2 – Dolphin day and Anguilla Hotels
Day 2 – More with the dolphins
Day 3 – Anguilla Restaurant and Home
Day 4 – Tortola Dolphin Swim
Day 5 – Anguilla Sailing

Any feedback on Anguilla? Any family travel stories you would like to share?
Have a great day!
God Bless,
John

Hi All,

We get so many request for this subject on starting a Career as a Marine Mammal Trainer. Since Dolphin World is only the tour operator and we make vacationer’s dreams come true with the dolphins, we really don’t have the answer on the technical side of the dolphins and how to get into this industry.

This website, Dolphin Trainer, has some great links and resources. Here is an excerpt from the site….

This website is produced and written by working marine mammal professionals who care for and train dolphins, whales, seals, sea lions, walruses and other marine mammal species. Depending upon our specific job duties and our host facilities’ preferences, we may be called trainers, animal care specialists, keepers, naturalists, mammalogists or various other titles. When first starting out we may be sub-classified as assistant or apprentice. After years of hard work and progress we may earn new titles denoting higher levels of achievement and authority, e.g., senior, lead, supervisor, manager, curator or director. For the sake of simplicity we will generally just refer to all of these “hands on” marine mammal professionals as trainers.

Please read from from this website. Can anyone give me some feed back on the website?
Does anyone out there have some more insights for the Marine Mammal career and future? Any good resources to look at?

I know on my Myspace friends list, I have trainers as friends and hopefully one them will give us some more feed back for all us to learn more.

Have a great day!
God Bless,
John

Hi all,

I just came back from an awesome trip to Anguilla. To tell you the truth, I never really heard of Anguilla unitl recently. My Aunt and Uncle invited me to go and stay with them in Anguilla. At first I was a little hesitant, but I am so happy I took them up on their offer. I love the beach, living in Ft. Lauderdale, and growing up on Long Island, but Anguilla is beach paradise, not to mention, snorkeling and reefs everywhere, crystal blue water, wonderful breezes off the shore, and the beautiful mountains of St. Martaan in the background. I hope heaven looks like this!

If you want more facts about the island, here is a story written about it. Believe it or not, the island, even has Dolphin Swimming in Anguilla

Here is a picture of me after a long day of snorkeling and swimming off a sailboat. We went to the east end of the island to see the last area that has not been developed.

Has anyone been to this island? Any feed back? Nice hotels? Secret Resturant finds? I plan to definately go back.

Have a great day!
God Bless,
John

Hi All,

Here is a great rebuttal to the blog post I made about the Dolphin Hunting in Japan. On the other hand, there are many Japanese that love and help the dolphins too. I guess the lesson here for me, who am I to judge. Here is the story on the Japanese dolphin after prosthetic tail, the story starts with
a Japanese dolphin is squealing with delight after receiving a prosthetic tail to replace one amputated due to a skin disease.

Fuji’s handlers at the Churaumi Aquarium in Japan’s southern most island of Okinawa say the fake tail may have saved her life as she had put on dangerous amounts of weight from being inactive after she lost her tail.

To Read More, go to: Prosthetic Tail

What do you think about this prosthetic tail being put on the dolphin and this story?

Have a great day!
God Bless,
John