Florida - The Second Week

 Our first week in Florida was fantastic.  My entire family stayed in a house together.  But unfortunately my brother, sister and my brother's girlfriend had to go home.  They have jobs or something.  So they all flew home and we stayed with my parents for an additional 4 days.  Which was good, because to have 4 days of driving for a week in Florida is crazy.

We spent the next 4 days in Treasure Island on the Gulf of Mexico.  We thought we would have a beach vacation.  Well we only spent a couple of hours at the beach because it wasn't exactly beach weather, but we still had a great time.  

John's Pass

We walked to John's Pass which was just down the road.  It's like a little boardwalk shopping area.  From the boardwalk we could see a bunch of Dolphins, which was so neat!  I just love Dolphins and I had never seen them in the wild like that.  So we decided to go on a Dolphin Watching trip, hoping that we would see tons of them.  Well the boat drove around for an hour and a half and we saw nothing.  (Although we did get some interesting history about the area.)  As we were pulling back into the dock, there were dolphins everywhere.  Of course.  So luckily we did see dolphins, but it turns out that the boardwalk is as good of a place to view them as any.

We also went into the Tampa Electric Manatee Viewing Centre for a few hours where we saw manatees.  Manatees are not the most exciting of creatures.  They are called sea cows for a reason.  But once again, seeing a creature like this in their natural habitat was pretty neat.  Plus, it was free.  

We had some great meals in Treasure Island and John's Pass.  Nothing like authentic seafood restaurants when you are on vacation!

Daddy dug him a hole

Yes he's short

First time in the ocean

Then it was time to head back home.  People think that we are crazy for driving to Florida with a baby.  But it really wasn't that bad.  I packed him toys to keep him entertained and would feed him what I could in the car.  He slept a lot and we made sure to stop frequently enough to let him stretch and to feed him.  I grew up driving to Florida and Myrtle Beach and I think that's why the idea of it didn't seem crazy to me because I knew how many times my parents had done it with me.

It was a great trip and I can't wait for many more to come with my little family!