Miami Swim With Dolphin Tours — Attraction in Miami

I am giving this 4 stars because the trainer Erika was absolutely unbelievable as we’re all of the employees we encountered during the day. Also because I have had to remind myself this day was all about enjoying these beautiful creatures which I’m sure is not predictable moment to moment. I will also say the booking experience was extremely pleasant and they were SO helpful! I do however have some suggestions around managing expectations of visitors and timing.

Areas that could improve: We drove 2.5 hours for an 11:00 Dolphin Encounter with three kids 10, 7 and 5. Check in was listed at 10:45 and they asked us to come back for an 11:00 swim. We rushed in for 10:45 and then came back at 11:00 but no one else checked in u til after 11:00. We waited until about 11:20 before anyone let us in. Then we went through an explanation of everything but at times it was difficult to hear the nice person explaining everything. Erika walked around and introduced herself to all of us. We paid for 2 on the Odessey package and Erika made sure our family stayed together. The manager was having a meeting with the trainers so we were not called to go in the water until some time after 12. An hour plus was a long time to be waiting around for adults nevermind three littles ones. Once we were in the water Erika was amazing and the kids were so happy. The other thing I would never do again is pay for the odyssey. For 100 extra dollars 2 of us held the dolphins fin for a quick 3 second or so swim. It was amazing but not worth 100 dollars in my opinion. Erika made sure to make my niece and another woman celebrating her birthday feel EXTRA special! Overall I thought the staff was amazing and the park which was extremely outdated was fine for younger kids, I’d just suggest that they manage expectations a little better around the waiting around or unpredictability of the scheduling. By the time we finished at 12:50 our plans for afternoon had to change quite a bit. Again, recognizing now it’s about the Dolphins I understand I shouldn’t have gone into the day rigid at all about times and schedules. Also just be prepared to spend 100-400 dollars on photos they take with so so quality. I should note they seem to treat the dolphins great which is probably the most important thing! Thank you Erika and staff...

Dolphin Odyssey (swim with the dolphins) at the Miami Seaquarium Incredible, once in a life time, bucket list experience!

Dolphin Tours was easy to book with and the phone reps were helpful and kind. One reason we booked through them as opposed to directly buying tickets from the Sequarium is because Dolphin Tours offers discounts.

About the Sequarium and the swimming with the dolphins encounter: The Seaquarium park is not big like Sea World, but it is perfect size for an interactive dolphin encounter. They have shows you can watch and lot of other things to do if you want to spend the day there. I read some negative reviews regarding size and being outdated. I did not find that to be the case. The only negative I would say was the younger park attendants were not nice or helpful (Dolphin Cove shop and photo store).

The Sequarium provides wet suits, water shoes, and towels. You change in a clean and modern bathroom with warm showers. Free lockers to store your belongings are right outside the bathrooms. After you change, you meet with a trainer and watch an informational video and learn about dolphins and sea life. Then it is showtime! We got split up into 2 groups of about 6-7 people - Our family of 4 and a couple. They have 15 dolphins. One of the dolphins did not wan to play so they brought out a new group of dolphins. It did not effect our dolphin time. These amazing, friendly, smart creatures do a few tricks for you. You go up to the dolphin one by one and get to pet them, kiss them, shake hands, feed them, look under water as they dribble a basketball (googles provided), and they will jump over your party as you pose for a picture. Photographer is right by and takes a picture of every encounter you have with the dolphin. (photo CD was $60, well worth it for the 59 pictures, but you can buy single shots for less or just snap your own pictures, if you have someone with you standing by the poolside). Then comes the best part - the dorsal fin swim. Such an amazing ride holding on to the fin while they glide through the pool with you on their backs. We were in the pool for about 45 minutes with them. Our family will treasure this magnificent memory forever. ...

One of our last destinations this last vacation, we paid about $60 each to get in the park. There are a lot of premium packages that start around $120 per person to encounter dolphins, penguins, sea lions, and manatees, but they are priced ridiculously high to eliminate participation by the masses. There are VIP tours as well that you can spend hundreds per person on and should schedule days or weeks in advance. This is a great option if you want to spend over $1k for an afternoon for a family of 5. Dolphin show was included but really typical of any zoo show. Probably should splash the audience more to generate some excitement. Kids were done after an hour or so, they have seen many of the tank window views over the years and there did not seem to be any wow factor. There are other shows but the kids were not interested in staying to see them. Park is clean, staff friendly, and parking was easy, but we thought the place was a snooze, not much to see between tanks although the kids did enjoy the elevated obstacle course that had a nominal fee and staffed by very helpful teens. Someone representing the business responded to say there are other free shows which I amended on my review, but I would suggest they visit other similar sites around the country to see that they could to do something to stand out. Brookfield Zoo has a better dolphin show. The birds around the dolphin tank during the show were more fun to watch. There is no reason not to have more excitement between tanks and around the viewing windows. Terribly dated. Probably looked great in the 70’s. But very costly. I was too kind with the three stars, I will amend...