St. Pete Trip July 17-19, 2008

Did I tell you that Rod's vacation wasn't approved for the trip to Illinois? His plan was to come up at the beginning of the time I was gone...but he waited too long to put in for it, so he won't be up in Illinois while I am gone. I am bummed, he is bummed--but we'll get over it.





Can you tell what these are? We have passed this area a hundred times and have always wanted to know more. This time we at least got a picture from the road. It is various sized Airstream Travel Trailers buried in a field. It is located between exits 17 and 14 on I-4 between Lakeland and Plant City. Anyone know the real story??

So, we decided to take a mini vacation over in St. Pete. We were just there to see the Cubs play, but, we found an inexpensive but nice place (Homestead Suites on Ullmerton Rd) to stay. So we hopped on I-4 and headed due west on Thursday after Rod got off work.

We had planned on finding the Sloppy Joe's on the beach, but, Rod was nodding off shortly after we had unpacked the van. So, we ordered in a pizza and settled down to watch a movie. Rod was out shortly, which left me to do some work I had brought.





Friday morning we were up early and headed down to Ft. DeSoto. This is a county owned beachfront park that offers lots of beaching, fishing, fort touring and even a dog park. You can camp, you can rent kayaks, you can bring your own boat and launch it at the ramp. It is an awesome place.

We headed to the North beach access point passing most of the public areas of the park. They have lots of parking, nice restrooms, great picnic pavillions and showers there. We picked out spot, put up the umbrella (thanks Mom!) and set about getting a tan. There were lots of people out sunning, swimming and even a catamaran stopped at the beach. The county most have summer camps for kids here, because several of the pavillions had troops of kids hanging out.

We were pretty lucky with the weather. The forecast had called for about a 70% chance of rain while we were gone. We swam, walked and enjoyed the sunshine and stayed on the beach until about noon. As we were leaving it started clouding up--but we never got rain!





Friday night we headed over to the ballpark for tailgating. The stadium wasn't nearly as full as for the Cubs game, but, we still had lots of company as we all warmed up for the big game. Toronto Jays vs. the first place Rays. Our first surprise--$22 for two party zone bleacher seats. St. Pete is still a cheap seat! Then as we entered the gate, we received two $5 Hess gas cards. As we made our way up to the nosebleeds, we saw that it was $1 hotdog night AND $3 Dos Equis beer. LOL...HEAVEN! We had an awesome time and they even won.



The view from our seats of the stadium dome and the catwalks...how do you get up there...I want to go! And from the smoking lounge on the west side of the stadium that has a great view of the sunsets...and the Police Station!


Saturday morning we had to be on the road by midmorning to spring Bonnie dog from puppy jail. Great trip and what a deal...if we spent $300 it would surprise me. AND that even includes $100 for kenneling Bonnie and getting her vaccines! LOL