{"id":36009,"date":"2025-11-06T16:37:26","date_gmt":"2025-11-06T16:37:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/36009\/"},"modified":"2025-11-06T16:37:26","modified_gmt":"2025-11-06T16:37:26","slug":"aquatica-orlandos-illuminate-debuts-as-company-tries-to-rebound-from-disappointing-quarter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/36009\/","title":{"rendered":"Aquatica Orlando’s Illuminate debuts as company tries to rebound from disappointing quarter"},"content":{"rendered":"

No one is swimming at Aquatica Orlando<\/a> on this warm November night.<\/p>\n

The lazy river and the kiddie pool are both strangely quiet.<\/p>\n

Instead, the park\u2019s paths are cast in a holiday glow with Christmas lights and lanterns shaped like animals in the water park\u2019s new lantern festival called Illuminate<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor the first time ever, we are transforming Aquatica into a nighttime dry experience where we\u2019re not going to focus on water slides and pools. Instead, we\u2019re going to focus on light, storytelling, and connection,\u201d Park President Brad Gilmore said during a media event Tuesday night.<\/p>\n

Kids can write letters to Santa, cook s\u2019mores over a fire pit or ride a miniature train while mom and dad sip spiked hot cocoa for a little merriment of their own.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Aquatica Orlando\u2019s Illuminate \u2014 the special ticketed event \u2014 is debuting this holiday season as Orlando makes the pivot from Halloween to Christmas in record time.<\/p>\n

Disney World\u2019s Mickey\u2019s Very Merry Christmas Party<\/a> starts Friday and runs through Dec. 21, while Universal Orlando<\/a>, SeaWorld Orlando<\/a> and Legoland<\/a> all gear up for special holiday entertainment and food.<\/p>\n

\"\"Aquatica Orlando\u2019s Illuminate. Image via Gabrielle Russon.<\/p>\n

For United Parks and Resorts, the Orlando-based company that owns SeaWorld and Aquatica, the final months of the year are an important time to make up gains.<\/p>\n

The company released its third-quarter earnings Thursday that showed attendance down 3% \u2014 to 6.8 million \u2014 compared to the same time last year, and revenue falling 6% to about $512 million.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re obviously not happy with the results we delivered in the quarter,\u201d CEO Marc Swanson said on the earnings call as the company blamed bad weather, a drop in international tourism and other factors for the dip.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
\n\"\"A scene from Aquatica Orlando\u2019s Illuminate. Image via Gabrielle Russon.<\/p>\n

Swanson kept an optimistic tone as he said the company gets into Christmas mode and opens new rides in 2026 \u2014 including in Orlando.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are focused, confident in the investments we are making,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Aquatica Orlando\u2019s Illuminate runs on select nights<\/a> from Nov. 8 to Jan. 31.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"No one is swimming at Aquatica Orlando on this warm November night. The lazy river and the kiddie…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":36010,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[7992,24959,1191,7993,139,141,140,2042,2043,2044],"class_list":["post-36009","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-aquatica","tag-brad-gilmore","tag-christmas","tag-illuminate","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-news","tag-orlando-theme-parks","tag-seaworld","tag-united-parks-and-resorts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36009","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36009"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36009\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36010"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36009"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36009"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36009"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}