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Travel Channel Films At Weeki Wachee Springs

By TONY HOLT

Weeki Wachee mermaid Shannon Tooker serves as a tour guide Sunday for a camera crew from the Travel Channel’s “Extreme Roadside Attractions.” She explains the pratfalls of spending hours of the day submerged underwater, having to breathe sparingly through a small tube and change costumes in a matter of seconds. The episode will air in June.

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By TONY HOLT

Hernando Today

Published: December 8, 2008

WEEKI WACHEE - The area's best-known roadside tourist attraction is known for its mermaids and their grace and elegance underwater.

Who knew a job as a mermaid could be considered extreme and dangerous?

Producers at the Travel Channel think it is.

All it took was a phone conversation with the park's marketing and promotions manager, John Athanason.

His description of a day in the life of a mermaid convinced a crew from the channel's "Extreme" series to spend an entire day at the Weeki Wachee Springs State Park.

The mermaids will be profiled for an upcoming episode of "Extreme Roadside Attractions," which will air in June.

On Sunday, a producer, cameraman and sound specialist watched a few mermaid shows and took a guided tour of the park - from the tube room where the swimmers enter the water to the locker room upstairs from the theater.

"We had a lengthy discussion about the mermaids and how their jobs are extreme," Athanason said of the recent phone call. "They work underwater. They have to deal with currents, cold water and turtles nipping at them at all times."

Audiences who watch the mermaid shows can see the turtles swimming with the mermaids. What they might not see is the ornery reptiles biting them during their routines.

The turtles see the women swimming everyday, so they ceased being skittish after a while. The mermaids will sometimes feed the turtles.

Whenever the turtles are hungry and the mermaids don't have food, they will bite, Athanason said. It is an added form of danger the performers must face each day.

"After I told them all that, they said, 'Yeah, we'd love to feature (the mermaids),'" he said.

The two-man crew took footage of the 12 p.m. performance Sunday, including several audience shots. The auditorium was half full, a decent crowd for a December show.

After the performance, the crew and producer were introduced to mermaid Shannon Tooker.

The producer was surprised at how relaxed and articulate the 19-year-old was in front of the camera. It wasn't Tooker's first time. She has appeared both on Japanese and German television.

Tooker talked about breathing, changing clothes underwater and recalled a story of when she nearly blacked out during a performance because she was short on breath.

"The show must go on," she said as she stayed on the appropriate topic. "You can't surface ... You just have to learn how to work through it."

The producer also interviewed a couple from Daytona Beach who brought their two sons, ages 6 and 2, with them to the park.

Greg and Tori Warren wanted to show them a piece of Florida's history - something purer than a park with carnival rides and mascots, they said.

They were happy to have their opinions aired on a future television show. To them, Weeki Wachee is far more extreme than Disney World.

"I like the history here," said Greg Warren. "Everything else is too commercial."

The Travel Channel is on Bright House channel 54.

Reporter Tony Holt can be reached at 352-544-5283 or wholt@hernandotoday.com.

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