Of Aquamaids and Giant Sponges

The brick path through the 10-acre tropical gardens meanders for a mile and takes about an hour to walk if you want to read the identification tags and enjoy the 5,000 exotic plantings. If you're a teenager and the trail is deserted, it's a fast jog and you can do it a couple of times before your aunt completes the circuit.

Walking to the car, which was parked for free a few feet from the front door -- not miles away in a satellite lot -- I was feeling soothed that remnants of my Florida childhood still existed. "So," I asked Gene, "what did you think?"

"You really saw the Beatles on TV in the '60s?"

Cypress Gardens (Winter Haven)

The aquamaids no longer wear tutus and tiaras, the human pyramid on skis is only three persons high, not four, and the audience has to listen to a half-dozen endorsements before the show begins. But the Cypress Gardens skiers are still doing their signature stunts -- barefooted, backward, over ramps and with a pair of wings.

Again, we were among a handful of midweek visitors: Fewer than 50 people attended the morning presentation on a made-to-order Florida day -- 84 degrees and sunny with a light breeze. Sunlight sparkled on the water as brightly as the silver sequins on the aquamaids' armbands.

In one routine, the ski team unfurled American flags. Their athleticism shone above the sentimentality as they wove in and out and circled the towboat on swivel skis, turned somersaults on wakeboards, flew off ramps. Girls skied while holding the tow rope by a foot and twisting their bodies into ballet poses. Guys hoisted them overhead in the adagio crowd-pleaser -- and a favorite subject of postcard photographers through the years.

The park, which announced it was closing amid a sharp tourism decline after Sept. 11, 2001, has been enhanced and rearranged since it reopened in 2005 as Cypress Gardens Adventure Park. You now enter through Jubilee Junction, a gantlet of 11 souvenir shops and several restaurants, before you get to the 75-acre botanical gardens and lake, and the new water park and amusement rides. The park is sort of divided in two: Historical attractions are on the left -- including Tarzan, the 74-year-old alligator who appeared in the jungle films with Johnny Weissmuller -- and new attractions are on the right.

We were turned off by the year-round Christmas offerings and lackluster dining options and souvenirs. Splash Island Water Park was closed until March. The ice rink wasn't open. Carnival rides twirled and twisted for the most part without a single thrill seeker, probably because most in attendance that day were old-timers. At any rate, the lack of activity was so oddly unappealing that we weren't even tempted to take a spin.

"It's really slow now. The pace picks up during summer when families vacation and the water park is open," said a clerk at the deserted Kara's Kastle, a shop that sells ballerina outfits and rents gowns to little girls -- and their mothers -- who want to be Southern belles for a day.

"What do you mean by Southern belle?" Gene asked as I led him in search of the real beauties -- park employees dressed in full belle regalia -- down Topiary Trail, site of leafy rabbits, swans and serpents.

"Girls in prom dresses," I replied, "and they must be playing hide-and-seek."

We finally inquired about their whereabouts and were given a map and a schedule. There is no longer a bevy of beauties like in the old days, when you could barely snap a photo without a hoop skirt in it. That day two were on duty, and they appeared only at a certain place at a certain time.