Discovery Cove

I was hoping to spend a great all inclusive day at Discovery Cove, while snorkeling with rays and tropical fish.

Had no desire for the Dolphin encounter as I swam with dolphins (in nature) while at Mozambique and had a Dolphin encounter in Cuba.

Lets start with the food: nothing to write home about, crowded restaurant areas lacking in healthy options, it was essentially bad junk food with long lines, even the desserts were bad (and I love sugar).

Drinks: they are available at a few spots, but not worth the "all inclusive" price tag.
You don´t get to sit on a chair sipping a cocktail you might not even get a chair - they were all occupied when we went in September (yesall), and you have to get on a line to get a drink.

Snorkeling with fish: extremely crowded, I felt like I was in a cheap and overbooked beach destination.

My kid loved the bird feeding, but you can do that for a tenth of the price somewhere else.

There we other pool areas and the otters, but nothing distinctive really.

I understand the calling, I absolutely love snorkeling and am a diver myself, but what you experience here is not comparable in any way.

My impression of the place was thumbs down all the way and kind of cheap, whilst I loved Seaworld and Gatorland.

Even with steep discounted tickets as a Seaworld passholder, I would have had a much better (and more relaxed) experience having spend that time at another park or even at a resort pool.

Discovery Cove is a nice concept for multiple animal experiences in a tropical setting. Exploring the reef and snorkeling with the fish and rays is engaging and the lazy river relaxing. The dolphin encounter was the highlight, touching and swimming alongside the dolphin, but also felt a bit scripted and anticlimactic. The otters were hiding and not seen throughout the day. The adorable marmosets sit at the feeding station in their trees on an island which is across a small moat from the lazy river. The aviary has a large variety of birds in three somewhat small habitats.

You need to buy an expensive photo package if you want photos of the dolphin experience because your group goes as one and cameras are not allowed. If you are on a budget, know you will spend at the least $180 for photos (8 photos with a frame and book) in addition to the admission. (all inclusive except mandatory photos. Lol.) A cheaper photo option includes 4 photos for $110 but is not adequate for a group.

The breakfast was below adequate with powdered eggs, bacon, fruit, parfaits, and breads, and the pulled pork with fries and chocolate cake lunch I had was average. I expected more for the price of admission.

Currently masks are mandatory in bathrooms, public areas of the restaurant, aviary (provided by an attendant outside), and locker area. Masks are not permitted in the water for animal safety. Have a plan for where to keep your mask when swimming. With only 2 people, my daughter and I spent too much of our morning visiting the locker to get and put away masks. It's better to save a chair in the middle of the park and leave a towel and mask there for easy access. I felt safe in the park.

The staff is exceedingly friendly especially in the dining and park entry area. The animal trainers were less open, a bit distant, and focused on procedure which surprised me. Then again visitors were asked 20-30 times to clear a path so rays could come in for feeding. Those guests continuously ignored the requests and returned to the area. So the quality of the guests may affect the quality of the experience.

Overall, we had a good time. I recommend this experience to those who can easily afford the admission and want animal experiences without leaving the USA. I prefer experiences in more natural settings and would travel to Belize or a Caribbean Island before visiting Discovery Cove again.

I have been waiting on a refund for my cancelled trip since 4/15/20. I have paid for and had to cancel a second trip on the same date. Discovery Cove owes me over $4000 in refunds and I have heard nothing from them in 56 days. I have tried to call and have spent more than 4 hours on hold and still haven't spoken to anyone. The only live person I can get on the phone is a poor security guard at the corporate office. He claims people are working in the customer service area. If so it must be one employee. The wait times have estimated between 25 and 2961 minutes. :-o. I have been waiting 50 minutes on the 25 minute estimate. If you are thinking about making reservations I would advise you not to. If your trip has to be cancelled it is hell to try and get your money back. This is the only them park in Orlando that won't move your reservations. They claim to offer a refund and want to charge you again to rebook. Please beware. I will be posting this at every review site I can find. I can't believe that after 4 messages and 2 emails they are so nice as to not respond with any response. Thanks for the excellent customer service. ;-(

Visited Discovery Cove during COVID so I’ll start with COVID procedures .

They give each guest a free masks along with hand sanitizer. Masks cannot be worn in the water except during the dolphin swim .

Due to COVID you cannot actually swim with the dolphins . You are in the water interacting with them , touching them , you get to do hand signals for them show you a few tricks, take some pretty awesome pictures , and ask the trainers as many questions as you’d like to .

Masks must be worn in the restaurant area . That’s pretty much the only area they are required.

The day is awesome . Breakfast, lunch, all day snacks, lockers , and parking are all included .

Breakfast consists of French toast sticks , eggs, and sausage . As well as cereal , muffins , danishes , fruit and yogurt .

For lunch some of the choices are spicy salmon , steak, chicken , hamburgers with fries veggies or rice , a variety of salad sides and dessert includes chocolate cake , cheesecake , and carrot cake .

The best tip I’ve read is do the aviary first . The birds are hungry and will flock to you like crazy it’s super fun .

The water is warm about 70 degrees in all areas except for the snorkeling area and the dolphin lagoon .

They provide animal friendly sunblock and snorkeling goggles .

If you purchase the 3 park pass it’s cost $25 to park at the other parks but if you get your pass from Discovery Cove you can pay one flat rate of $25 and park at any of the Seaworld parks for the entire 14 days for that one rate .

It didn’t feel crowded at all . My entire family loved it. My kids are 18, 16, and 2 and they all equally enjoyed the day .

I have been going to Discovery Cove over Spring Break for several years now and I have loved the park and all it has to offer.
However, I am writing this review because I purchased tickets in Nov. 2019 for March 18th, 2020. They shut down the parks the Monday before and we were told over the phone and through an e-mail that we would be reimbursed for the full amount of the tickets.
We waited a respectful time for the refund until we started calling their staff to see what the processing time was.
We started calling in May of 2020 and now it is February 2021. 11 MONTHS later and still no refund!
Every time we call we get the run around. Here are some of the responses we got: processing times may take longer, a refund will be processed within 14 days after calling, "escalation" e-mails are sent to management for resolution to the problem, "We do not understand why it has taken so long", and the list goes on.
We also had a unique case where we purchased the tickets with a credit card that no longer exists because the account was closed. We had to request an alternate refund payment.
Managers have confirmed with us that a payment will be sent to us in the mail. Can you guess? NO payment.
I am reading about many people not getting their refunds from Discovery Cove and it is very alarming. Don't state that a refund is coming and then hope we forget when it doesn't. If this is still happening, please don't let this go.

Was definately excited to take the family here , have never been and couldn’t wait to do the dolphin swim with the boys . The park is gorgeous, so beautiful and tropical very well done for sure ! The swim River was awesome absolutely amazing couldn’t get enough of it . The snorkeling with sting rays and fish was nice but could be better but wow some of the rays were huge an enjoyable experience . The food and drinks were pretty good and the snack bar well the kids loved those Especially the cookies and pretzels and the slushies. Nice to just go and grab when ever you want . Must say for the price you pay to add the dolphin encounter or swim I was extremely not happy . I wouldn’t recommend it here you pay less in mexico and a hell of a lot more time with the dolphins way better experience and the pictures taken down there were just incredible . This place was a let down for that tbh. I expected it to be my family of 4 to find out your actually in groups of 10 and by the time you watch the video and get in the water your lucky to have had 3 mins each with the dolphins at all Because the whole group has to have time with them . I really think for the cost we should’ve had our family of 4 encounter alone that’s what I expected it I never would’ve bothered . I also bought the picture package and paying over $200 us (I’m canadian so cost me way more than that) I was expecting a ton of pictures of all of us and well taken ones . Well the photographer took like 40 pictures all together of my family that’s it and about half of them weren’t even very good . My son not looking or my hubby kissing the dolphin and had his hands cover it but he immediately removed his hands but she never retook another pic . It’s like she just took pics and didn’t care if we were looking or to capture a good shot and once we were done they didn’t even realize we bought the picture package and had to go find it . So not happy with that much money being spent and the confusion of it . Disorganized for sure ! So yes I would go here again without the dolphin swim and I would recommend it for sure but yet again it you want an amazing dolphin experience and your money’s worth it’s not here definately go somewhere else for that .

My sister and I really enjoyed our time at Discovery Cove. Such a beautiful place with heated pristine water, lovely foliage and birds to look at; even the food was good, with lots of options. My sister did the dolphin swim and while the swim itself was very short she still enjoyed being in the water with the dolphins, seeing them do tricks. The one downside is that they make it difficult to get a good photograph and the photos they take are VERY expensive! But that is a minor issue in an otherwise lovely day. The day was cool for Florida but sunny and we were not cold like I thought we would be.

On May 10 we were emailed that our trip for the twentieth was cancelled due to Covid. I called immediately after receiving the email and told I would be issued a refund in full. I emailed several weeks later and got a generic response that my refund was in the queue. It is now August 17th, over 100 days since a refund was promised and Discovery Cove has no longer responded to emails, social media posts, or the BBB complaint I filed over a week ago. Our airfare was refunded immediately and we had a cruise booked for August with Norwegian who refunded within 30 days, for reference. This is unacceptable and feels borderline illegal at this point. We would have loved to take our four year old here after the pandemic ends as our four year old loves stingrays and otters. As the pandemic is still ongoing, take caution to protect your hard-earned money! Only book with companies with fair and honest business practices regarding refunds.

Really impressed with many aspects of Discovery Cove. The park is divided into three main areas - the lazy river area with several wildlife attractions including otters and marmosets, the dolphin bay which is the largest part of the park but you only get to enter if you have purchased a dolphin experience and then the grand reef which offers snorkelling in clear sea water with a wide range of tropical fish and rays.

Breakfast and lunch as well as drinks and snacks are included - the food was pretty good but very long queues at lunchtime.

For us the highlight was the grand reef you would honestly find it difficult to find such a fantastic array of tropical fish anywhere. Sure you get great snorkelling and diving in many places but there was so much to see in a relatively small area. The rays were incredible with some really large ones including a spotted Eagle ray, just stunning. Slight frustration were the number of people snorkelling and its inevitable that people are going to barge into you.

The park supposedly keeps a strict limit on the number of people they let in to ensure it doesn’t get to crowded, in my opinion they let fat to many people in and it did feel very crowded. Another frustration was that each area had a shortage of available sun beds a number of times it was difficult to find available sun beds. Most of the sun beds just have stuff left on them but aren’t actually being used, really think that the park needs to do a better job of managing this.

The staff that we came across were nice and the whole place was very clean and well kept.

Would give this five stars apart from its overcrowded and lack of available sun beds.

Overall would recommend for a day out but try and make sure it’s a warm one😀

Let me first start off by saying I LOVE discovery cove and the park itself is fantastic and a great experience; however, the customer service phone representatives and supervisors are HORRIBLE and the reason for this one star review!
We had tickets to come to the park in April, but obviously couldn’t go because the park was closed due to Covid. I called in March and spoke to someone on the phone to discuss my options for refund. The person I spoke to said it was too early to provide a refund but I could get one if I called back after my reservation date. She also mentioned we can reschedule our tickets for a later date before end of the year and get a free upgrade. I told her I would likely need a refund but I would check with my travel companion (my mother) to see if we could possibly reschedule for a later date. Flash forward to me calling after my reservation date for a refund, and I am put on hold by the representative for twenty minutes to inquire about my refund. When she returns, she says she cannot issue a refund but I can pick another date before end of the year. I remind her that I had already been told by a previous representative that I would be entitled to a refund once my reservation date arrived. I ask to speak to a supervisor and I am put on hold for another twenty minutes (40 minutes of call time total). A very unfriendly, supervisor gets on the phone and finally agrees to submit a claim to the refund department but tells me it’s going to be a very long time before my refund gets placed back on my card, and has no guesstimate of when that will be- fine, I’m ok with that. Due to the misleading conversations I had already had via phone with other representatives, I asked her if she could kindly provide me an email confirming that I will in fact be entitled to my refund once the refund department gets around to it. She tells me she will not do that! She tells me I should trust her because she is a supervisor and I can always “call back” and wait on hold for a lifetime and she will be sure she leaves it in the notes section of my reservation for who i speak to next. Forgive me if I’m not very trusting after this experience, and I am appalled that she would not provide her confirmation of refund in writing.
I am just disgusted with the customer service discovery cove is provided during a GLOBAL pandemic! For that reason, I would likely not be purchasing advance tickets with them ever again. Buyers beware!