Florida, like last year, was pretty incredible. It was awesome to have warm weather, people smiling, the ability to see the sun, Disney, and, all the fantastic food.
Winter wasn’t great in Minnesota this year. We left for Florida toward the end of February so the worst of the bad weather in Minnesota was largely over. However, it’s still cold, it’s still windy, it’s still snowy, and, we still don’t see a whole lot of the sun in winter in Minnesota – unlike Florida.
We flew in and out of Tampa and made a short trip to Disney. This year we went to Magic Kingdom and it was as incredible as one expects. The fireworks show was spectacular too. We saved some of the rides for after the fireworks when Disney was clearing out; farrrrrrr better to skip the lines. I was surprised with how mediocre the rides were at Magic Kingdom. While they were neat, in general, they were just that, neat. I think of the lines and the heat and I think of how “not worth it” it is for me. But, we were able to see Elsa a couple of times and a bunch of other princesses, it was fantastic for everyone :).
One of the bigger surprises was the strawberry ‘stand’ we stumbled across between Tampa and Orlando. We learned that lots of strawberries are grown in Florida and we hit the peak time. There was a small shop on the side of the highway with some picnic tables and they were selling gargantuan strawberry shortcakes for an extremely reasonable price.
One of the most novel events was celebrating Chinese New Year in a massage parlor converted to a law firm. There were dragon dances and super loud drumming inside this tiny little law office. It was a 10/10 experience! The dragon dance troupe was a high school troupe and they were visiting various businesses in the Tampa Chinatown area throughout the day. The timing worked out for us to visit the law firm and I’m very glad we did – such a unique experience.
The Gulf of Mexico was great and we found a ton of shells. The weather was great for the beach and we had a fabulous time in our rented cabana.
The food is always great: fried shrimp at the various places and char kway teow at Hawkers. I felt like I ate my body weight in extremely unhealthy food and it wouldn’t have been nearly as good of a vacation otherwise.
Some other big surprises:
- We had a chance to hang with the pilot before flying!
- We were able to see the stars in Tampa on the beach – Tampa is BRIGHT. It surprised us we could see anything in the sky at night.
- We had a chance to see an alligator again! This one was kind of a ‘pet’ and was fed by a local restaurant.
Enjoy the photos!
Chris W.
