Weeki Wachee- Real Florida Magic

Back when I was a child, back before the Rat ate my state, there were amazing places to visit in Florida and amazing things to see and do at those places. You could hardly throw a coconut patty without hitting a bird riding a bicycle on a tightrope, a bevy of beauties (as they were always advertised) being towed around a lake on water-skis, a monkey riding a unicycle, a Seminole rasstlin' a 'gator, or an orchid blooming fuchsia under a clear blue sky with hundreds of wide-eyed tourists looking on, eager to pay for the pleasure of seeing the unusual, the tropical, the exotic.

There were Stuckey's placed every fifty miles or so on all the main highways. Stuckey's had cool roofs and were great places to stop and pee, get a hamburger and an ice cream cone, buy a rubber alligator and stock up on pecan logs and saltwater taffy to tide you over until the next teal blue roof appeared on the horizon.


These were simpler times and we simple folk were satisfied and even amazed at simpler attractions than people are today. We didn't require monster roller coasters or animatronics. Palm trees and blue water and all the really cool things you could find around them were enough for us. Hell, for most Yankees, the sight of an orange grove was enough to inspire a spate of postcard-writing.

Ah. Good times.

My favorite attraction, far and above all the rest, was Weeki Wachee Springs. My mother, little brother and I went there in the early sixties and that trip remains as one of the best times of my childhood. We stayed at the little mom-and-pop motel across the highway from the attraction and just staying in a motel was pretty exciting. They had air-conditioning!

But the park was amazing. There were gardens and an animal show and even an "authentic" Seminole Indian village with chickees and a little train that transported the tourists through the swamp to look at the village.

There was a terrific gift shop where my mother bought me one of those great necklaces that spelled out my name in golden wire and had a tiny diamond (and I'm sure it was real) dangling from it. Also, a 45-RPM record that played the Weeki Wachee song. "Weeki Wachee is the place to be..." went the tune, and I sang and danced along with that record for years.

But the best, the whole deal, the reason for the very existence of the Weeki Wachee attraction, were the mermaids. There was an underwater theater where the audience was seated and when the curtain was rolled up over the glass wall in front of us, the spring was revealed and in the spring, as the sun dappled the gently waving eel grass growing in the deep bowl of white sand, three unimaginably beautiful mermaids were suspended in the air-clear water, smiling and blowing gentle bubbles. They began to dance and twirl in the water, doing slow-motion, no-gravity ballet and my life was transformed. A lifelong obsession with mermaids began right there that day and I knew that not only were mermaids real, but that there was indeed real magic on this earth and that it all happened underwater. I yearned with all my heart to be a mermaid too, and practiced holding my breath and twirling underwater whenever I found myself in a pool.

I grew up and realized, finally, that I was never to be a mermaid myself. I became a mother instead, and there was magic in that, too. Part of the magic was knowing that I could take my own kids to Weeki Wachee Springs and I did. We must have made at least three pilgrimages over the years to the springs to worship the mermaids and enjoy the animal shows and the Dippin' Dots (The Ice Cream of the Future!). The Seminole village disappeared, as did the little train, but a water park sprang up right next to the theater and the kids loved that. It was always a terrific little vacation and every one of my children fell in love with mermaids and was as enchanted by them as I was when I was a kid.

Last weekend we all went down there together. All four kids, a soon-to-be-son-in-law, and my husband, too, who somehow had never been. We were meeting up with my old friends from nursing school with their kids and we were staying at the motel across Highway 19 from the attraction. The old mom-and-pop where I stayed is long gone. I think it was replaced by a Holiday Inn, which became a Best Western, and now is undergoing renovation by what appears to be an Indian family and I find that a nice, tidy little circle of goodness.

My kids (ages 31, 29, 21, and 18) were all terrifically excited to be going and I was too, although I was worried at what I'd find at the park. The last time I went, back about six years ago, I could see that things had definitely slid downhill and the fate of the park was then in question. It still is. NPR just ran a program about it and who owns it and how uncertain its future is.

It seemed to be holding its own. The gardens were nice, there were still Dippin' Dots (is it the future yet?) and there's a little river-boat cruise and an animal show and the water park seemed very popular.

But the best, as always, was the mermaid show. The magic of that has never faded for me. When the curtain (looking a bit worse for wear, I have to say) is rolled up over the glass and the mermaids are revealed, tears come to my eyes. In this world of high-tech everything, there is something so unbelievably and indescribably beautiful about seeing gorgeous young women, swimming and floating and dancing in the pure, sweet water, connected to life on earth only by an air hose that they sip from to stay alive, to stay breathing in that other world just a few feet away from us as we watch, enchanted. There are few cynics at the Weeki Wachee mermaid show. What is there to be cynical about? No one is trying to trick anyone. No one is making false claims. These women are indeed mermaids. Magical, mythical, beautiful, athletic, graceful, smiling mermaids who dance and twirl and even drink coca cola out of small glass bottles, just like they did when I was a kid.

It was a great weekend. I loved seeing my old friends and getting to know their children and husbands a bit better. It was awesomely wonderful to go on a family vacation with all four of my babies and the man, as well. We visited, we ate, we drank, we swam, we laughed.

But the best, the very, very best, was the moment when we were all sitting, front and center in the underground theater when the curtain was pulled and once again we were able to all be children again, to gasp in wonder at the cold, clear water where three women floated as if by magic, while friendly turtles swam about, and the sun dappled their faces and the white sand, and the bubbles rose to the surface, and one of the mermaids dove deep into the bottomless cave below and we all held our breaths with her as she disappeared from view for what seemed like way too long, and then, like a childhood dream returned, swam back into our sight, alive and well, a smile on her face as her mermaid hair floated around her.

Grace. Grace-full.
You don't find much of that at Disney now do you?

No, for me, Weeki Wachee is the place to be.

Always and forever.
I sure hope we have that option.
What kind of a world would it be for my grandchildren-to-be if I can't take them there when they are old enough?
A very sad world. For me, anyway.
Go. Visit. See the City of Live Mermaids. It's straight down the road. Take a left at the Capitol and keep on going 'til you get there. You can't miss it.
You really can't miss it.

P.S.
I'm reading a terrific book about Weeki Wachee by Lu Vickers and Sara Dionne. It has the whole wonderful, wild history of Weeki Wachee and I am discovering that the inception of that attraction has quite a few ties with our own beloved Wakulla Springs. And Johnny Weissmuller, too, my own first, best, and always crush.
See? Magic.