Beach Fun in St. Tropez...

Ashlynn did a good deed by fetching this bag out of the Mediterranean.

Then she had fun playing fetch in the water with this funny little dog. Afterwards, we walked up to the fort on the top of the hill only to discover that it was closed for renovations. We found an Italian restaurant with a terrace for lunch, then had some gelato before heading back to the ferry.

St. Tropez...

The next day we caught a ferry over to St. Tropez. We started with a visit to their market, which was much larger and varied than the market in Port Grimaud. We were happy to find lace dresses for us girls for our 20th wedding anniversary celebration this summer.

 After shopping, we wandered by the port.

Orca Photo Ops...

Our tour ended with this special photo op. We were told to kneel and not to turn around and then this orca was commanded to go behind us. We later found out that he was an old whale with no teeth.

When the show in the afternoon was over, there was another photo op in front of the tank.

More Killer Whales...

 The baby made a real splash!

We enjoyed seeing this feeding up close and personal after the show.

The High Point of the Day...

There is no doubt that the high point for each of us was the time we spent near the killer whales. Ashlynn dreams of being an orca trainer, so watching the show from a vantage point just to the side of the main stage was truly special.

After the show, we got to spend about 20 minutes speaking to this trainer, who’s originally a dancer from Portugal. Due to several accidents at other marine parks, the trainers are no longer allowed in the water with the orcas, which he explained creates another series of risks for humans now that the animals are no longer used to that close human contact. 

Jimmy got come very cool shots from this spot. Sadly, the whales were performing for very small crowds as the threatening rain must have scared folks away.

The Shows...

Pardon me for skipping out of order... After our ;private tour was over, we grabbed some lunch and watched the seal, dolphin and killer whale shows. Marineland is relatively small and wouldn’t have taken all day if we hadn’t done the special tour, but the shows were quite good.

I especially liked this unique stunt with the dolphins.

Meeting a Seal...

The next stop on our tour was to meet a seal. While us girls had been kissed by a seal in Curacao, this was actually our first chance to pet a seal. First we each felt her flipper, then petted her soft coat.