Monday April 20: Last Day at St. Petersburg

It's been a nice last couple of days here. This is an extremely bike friendly downtown - a dedicated bike lane totally separated from traffic!

Sadly we only discovered it today :-)

We ended up spending one more day here than planned due to the storms rolling around the Florida area.

Last night's lightening and thunder show was the closest we've seen in a while. It almost seemed as thought the lightening was hitting some of the high rises around the downtown area - the flash and the thunder were almost simultaneous.

The museums are all done! The history museum right across the road from the marina was small but interesting.

It presented both the history of Florida itself as well as the history of the development of St. Petersburg.

Best? There was a movie :-) Highlights of the movie focused on the first 'for hire' flight: from St. Petersburg to Tampa - a short 20 minute flight compared to the hours travel by either railway or car. Huge signed baseball collection as well.

This is one of the boats that went out yesterday for the Poker Run. Think this might just be the truck that hauls it??

Crazy huge with 3 doors - and a parking ticket! Oops .....

Today was the Holocaust Museum. Truly sad and amazing that anything like that could have actually happened. One of the goals of the museum was to tell the story from the eyes of people from the area who actually were there.

Very well done.

The last few days we've also ridden around The Pier. A structure built in 1973 that I'm sure in its heyday rivaled the Navy Pier in Chicago. Sadly it has been closed for some time due to structural issues. Now it's just sitting there - although it is still open to anyone that wants to walk, bike or fish around it.

And so it is definitely time to go. We've overstayed but weather will do that to you sometimes. Tomorrow there is still some chance of thunderstorms but we'll be in very protected waters and should be able to be to Caladesi State Park before more rain is coming through.

Saturday April 18: Chihuly and Powerboats

First on the agenda yesterday was a ride to the Chihuly glass exhibit. Left is the towering glass sculpture which made the museum very easy to find :-)

Once again we have learned about an artist that is quite well known - this time for glass blowing sculptures rather than paintings.

The artist, Dale Chihuly, is well known for a variety of subjects - one of which is chandeliers. There were two of his creations here in the gallery at St. Pete's.

They are pretty amazing - as are all of the various pieces on display. Need a showpiece chandelier? Only $150,000 for every 3 foot length!

Other pieces were displayed in groups depending on the theme of the pieces.

I particularly liked the baskets and the "underwater" display".



For more info on some of his work, click here.

More items displayed (not by Chihuly) are for sale - a mere $13,000 per piece.

Of course the next stop was a ride to the Glass Stop and Hot Shop for a demonstration of how blown glass pieces are made.

It was quite interesting to watch this artisan make a basket with a very wide opening.

The physical strength needed to work this piece of glass was really surprising.

The person assisting commented that the tendons and joints just really get worn because the leverage that the weight of the glass on the end of a five foot creates.




There are also many murals around the city. I haven't seen all that many but did see that there was a walking tour for anyone interested in learning more. Not for me ....

Then we noticed the boat trailers in the park next door.

Looks like a Poker Run is in town!

The first time we ran into one of these was in Kingston, Ontario this past summer. These boats are just crazy! And all of them have monster trucks painted to match the boat - of course :-)

We rode to the park just north of our marina. Not only were there big, fast power boats but lots of food vendors!

The Greek place got us - chicken kabobs - or whatever the Greek name for them would be.

Entertainment all day and lots of artists set up with some amazing pieces- from all over the country.

First ever: ATM machine set up in the vendor area!








More pictures of some of the more interesting art pieces.

It's been a great few days here at St. Petersburg. One of these days we may need to think about moving on north :-)

Thursday April 16: Dali Day

Steve had the bikes off and we were ready to go by 9 or so.

Weather is quite warm - highs in the mid-80's and very humid.

This is the kind of day where biking is best in the morning when it's cool hence the early start for the day.

Destination: the Dali Museum.

St. Petersburg is a great place to bike! Everything to see is mostly in a large rectangular area right by the marina. There is also a trolley that runs around the area as well. Once again a great time to be a senior: only a quarter to ride :-)

The museum itself is an amazing building and the history of how the collection happened is quite interesting.

Reynold and Eleanor Morse first saw Dali's work at the Cleveland Museum of Art. They ended up with a lifelong friendship with the artist and eventually donated more than 200 of his works to the museum here in St. Petersburg.

For more info on the museum and the Morses, click here.

A different side of the building.

And of course we LOVE audio tours, right? This one was quite well done - with the history and the background for many of the paintings.





Below is a really cool painting that from 20 meters away, is a portrait of Lincoln.

But up close, it's a picture of Dali's wife looking out a window overlooking ---- forget where :-(

Here's the same painting from 20 meters away.

Another fun painting: The Hallucinogenic Toreador.

The green is the tie of the bullfighter and he is looking to his left holding the red cape. It took me a while to see the face and even then it seemed to come and go. Maybe that's why he named it such??

Regardless, it really was a very impressive exhibit. And I definitely learned a great deal about Dali!!








Inside the glass on the third floor of the museum - looking out over one of the marinas on the waterfront.



This place definitely was a reminder of Chicago - just a smaller scale.


Steve particularly liked the staircase which wound from the first floor to the third floor and apparently spirals were one of Dali's favorite objects.

We did manage to find the Fountain of Youth along our path. Steve decided he should take a drink - just in case it was for real :-)


Other sightings: the local soccer field with the lamest forwards I've ever seen ....


a giant sundial - sadly it was cloudy so we couldn't use it to tell the time ....

and a cool looking building that reminded us of St. Augustine....




Not sure where we'll go tomorrow but I'm sure it will involve more bike riding around!

Wednesday: St. Petersburg

One last breakfast out at the Cortez Cafe (this is the sign of the place next door - thought it was great given we could often bike faster than the cars going by!) and we were ready to go.

The trip to St. Petersburg would be about 3 hours across the lower end of Tampa Bay. Steve was fishing but there was once again no catching! Guess we need Peter and Cheryl with us to catch anything .....

The large freighters were out - this one passing under the Tampa Bay Bridge as we approached.

A second one was headed out of the Bay to the Gulf.  Under the bridge are huge concrete filled "bumpers" just in case a freighter should happen to miss the opening. At least it wouldn't bring down the bridge.

We've actually never been to this area by car but I wasn't too surprised to see all of the high rises along the water. Tampa Bay is amazing shallow for such a large body of water though. Much of the water you see in this picture is less than 5 feet deep.

After settling in on the transient dock (in between the 65' and 50' yachts :-) ), the dockmaster told us if we were willing to move into a slip around the corner, we could stay for more than just the two days he had at the transient dock.

Easy enough - we're settled for a few days now. The ducks showed up looking for a hand out. Clearly they are being fed by the boaters ;-)

Time to relax and check out what there is to do here!

Tuesday April 14: Ready to Leave the Seafood Shack!

It's finally time to move on. Peter and Cheryl are back at Indiantown for a couple of weeks and Terri and Scott are heading north to Ohio.

Time for us to move as well. Yesterday's Dream is nice tucked in on an inside dock at the Seafood Shack. Still can be a bit rolly with the waves but it just lets us know we're on a boat!

This picture is taken from the Cortez bridge over the waterway. We were on our way to Anna Marie Island.

We rode across the bridge and then turned south on the only highway that runs the length of Longboat Key.

Steve rode all the way to the end where the inlet from the Gulf enters. He said it was really nice!

Guess I'll take his word for it since I found a nice bench in the shade with my name on it :-)

It's been quite warm down here - I think it's definitely getting to be time to head north again.

The fishing from the dock has been entertaining but certainly not like the last time we were here.

Sandy and her husband (she taught Steve how to fish in this area) is no longer at this marina - perhaps they are out traveling. No one really seemed to know - which I thought was odd but there have been quite a few changes since we were here last. New docks, new dockmaster, change in ownership of the restaurant.

Still a good place for us given the proximity to Terri and Scott's.

Ever hear of a guard rooster? Neither had we until we went to a local place for lunch. No worries about scaring this guy away - the railing was his. Period!



Smart move by Steve staying away from this guy :-)




We also happened upon what appeared to be a float parade parked along one of the side streets. Wonder what parade it was for? Quite impressive actually!



Time for one last sunset here at the Seafood Shack - we're off tomorrow for St. Petersburg. One of the few cities we have never been to by car before.

It sounds quite interesting - we may need to get the weekly rate for a dock ......

Sunday April 12: The Seafood Shack

The Seafood Shack is an older marina located relatively close to Steve's sister home in Bradenton so it makes a natural place for us to stay while in the area.

And Peter and Cheryl were headed this way as well (including the interesting trailer Peter crafted to fit his needs!) so they came and spent one more night with us. We'll see them this summer in Canada .....

In the meantime, Terri and Scott arrived and joined us on the flybridge for a trip out to the Manatee River.


We were in search of dolphins again. Last year was quite successful with a number of dolphins coming to play in our front bow wave.

This year wasn't quite as good but it was a beautiful day. Twice we had a single dolphin join us for a while.

They are always fun to watch!

There were some really strange cloud formations over the Tampa Bay Bridge - not sure what that was all about but it didn't rain or anything.

Just very hot. And getting hotter. Maybe we should be going north sooner?

But then when we spoke with the marina in New York (near Syracuse) where Guppy is stored, there is still snow on the ground.

Think we'll just stick with the plan of leaving here in a couple of weeks ;-)

There was a minor battle for the remains of the fish I cleaned for dinner last night. Last two of the mackerel Steve and Peter caught.

The crane sat on the railing of our boat and even though it was the largest bird around, it couldn't move as fast as the small gulls that zoomed in when Steve tossed a piece of fish into the water.

Steve was curious to see how the mackerel fared being frozen (but frozen very fresh) - still excellent. Nicely breaded in crushed pretzels (he ran out of bread crumbs) and lightly fried in garlic butter. Once again a great job with the fish!

We'll stay until Wednesday and then continue north. Not sure how far we'll go - depends on the weather. Terri and Scott are headed back to Ohio soon as well.

In the meantime, we're on the lookout for any strange animal sightings - like this hippo that we spotted the other day.

Why would someone want a hippo in their front yard?

Somedays I'm just at a loss ......