Long Weekend Trip

The highlights of our trip revolved around food. We discovered Popeye’s biscuits – so very tasty, and we discovered Gelato (Wow! Is that stuff fantastic.) I think I may have to make some of my own in my ice cream maker. They had a sign in the store saying it was so much lower in fat & calories than ice cream, but it sure didn’t taste like it.

The hotel was nice. We liked that it was a 2-room suite, so one could be sleeping and wouldn’t hear the other watching tv, it was actually pretty sound-proof. Right now I am typing outside our room, apparently once you get to our room the wireless connection is lost (we were the last room in the row). So, a bit of an inconvenience. It was also nice to have a room with a kitchenette in it, that way we could keep cold beverages and reheat food. The hot breakfast (they cooked) was a nice freebie, but I kinda wish they had fresh fruit too, which we bought at the grocery store and had a stock of food in our room.

As far as attractions are concerned. We went to the Pier in St. Petersburg and that blew. Then we drove along the beach towns there. We also went to the outlet mall about 45 minutes out of Tampa. I bought some more maternity pants and some cute items from Children’s Place for the baby. We went to Lowry Zoo. The baby elephant w/ mom was very cute. The zoo was pretty nice, but it seemed like EVERYONE there had a kid or 2 under the age of 5 with them. Andy was freaked out by a rhino there, as it had a very erect penis and it seemed to follow Andy as we moved away (kinda like when the eyes of a painting follow you.) I was more freaked out by the chimp with the semi that seemed to have splooged on itself. Ewwwww…… I would recommend the zoo, especially if you have kids. We tried to check out the Tampa Bay History Center, and after some difficulty finding it and paying for parking, turns out the place is closed until further notice. We also went to MOSI, which basically sucked. Lots of the stuff was broken and it was less than half the size as the Science Museum of MN. The IMAX was about Mount Everest and was pretty good. People who climb that are just nuts. I would say yourself the admission price on MOSI and try some place else.

Tampa seems to like businesses that us ‘n’ in everything, like Kash’n’Karry, Beepers’n’Phones, Beer’n’Kegs, there are more I just can’t think of them.

For food places, we checked out Popeyes (since we don’t have those by us – highly recommend the biscuits), Mama Mia’s (a pizza joint, decent pizza), Shells Restaurant (a chain thing in FL, seafood type place, the food was good),Krispy Kreme (yes, we have those in MN, but I only ever eat any when we go on vacation), MacArthur’s Deli (got sandwiches and salad, was ok, would have preferred Subway), The Bamboo Club (in International Plaza – which we would have found that place before tonight – highly recommend it. HUGE portions.) and Scully’s Hut (in Madiera Beach, decent food). Oh, and we can’t forget the gelato place called Gelateria del Duomo (A MUST!)

The weather for the entire trip had highs of 80+ degrees. The sun wasn’t out much until today and it was fantastic today, mid 80’s and sun. We actually sat out by the pool for a while. I’m not looking forward to seeing snow in MN and feeling the cold, but oh well. Looks all week it is supposed to be in the mid-upper 30’s and no pre-cip, which is amazing for January.