Our Get-Away (Day 2)

We were both so exhausted after our first day that we slept descent that first night.  Our pillows were old and flat, so we added buying new pillows to our list of things to do that day!  (If you didn't know, I'm a bit of a weirdo in the pillow department.  I need at least 3 a night, and I prefer my own, but because we flew, I had to leave mine at home.)

We took off early on Day 2 to head to Fort Desoto Park.  It was about an hour away from Clearwater.  My parents had gone before and found great shells there.  We wanted to get there early so we left the condo shortly after 7. We stopped at Dunkin Donuts for breakfast.  I had a coffee cake muffin and Kevin got a crossoint sandwich.  Our shelling dreams didn't come true at Fort Desoto Park, but the beach was beautiful and there were some historic things worth seeing that peaked Kevin's interest!

We left the park about lunch time and stopped at Chick Fil A for salads!

We headed back towards Clearwater.  There was a Christmas shop I wanted to stop at on the main highway back.  We bought an ornament and also found two cute stuffed mermaids for the girls.  We made a pit stop at Sam's Club and bought 2 new pillows too.  Kevin wanted to rent bikes for a couple hours, so we headed to the strip in Clearwater.  

Parking is a major issue around the entire beach.  There's no free parking, and all the lots/streets fill up quickly.  We found a store's parking garage with open spots.  We had to walk through the store to get out to the strip, which worked out great because neither Kevin or I packed a hat and we both wanted one.  The store was adorable!  The clothes and jewelry were all so cute and the kids clothes and toys were just as fun!  We both bought a hat and made our way out front to the bike rentals.

There were several bike styles to choose from, including one tandem bike.  We both thought it looked like fun but the saleswoman told us it feels very different to ride and encouraged us to take it for a test drive.  It was so awkward and we almost crashed on the sidewalk.  We decided to go with regular bikes and they were so much fun to ride!  We had baskets on the front so we put our waters, map, phones, and purchases in them.

We rode up and down the main strip.  Kevin suggested we take a quick break at our favorite Florida ice cream shop, Kilwins.  It was delicious.  He got vanilla, I got cookies and cream.

We wanted a snorkel set and rode our bikes over to Walgreens off the strip.  Before we headed to the check out, I told Kevin we should pick up a bottle of aloe.  The cheapest brand had three different choices.  I was trying to read one bottle, and when I grabbed it, I knocked a whole row of bottles down.  I was embarrassed and tried to fix them, and in the process knocked down a second row.  My hands were full so I asked Kevin to try.  He knocked down two more rows on his first clean up attempt.  We were both dying laughing but still felt like we needed to fix them.  So, Kevin made another attempt and knocked down two more rows.  We were in disbelief that these bottles were so hard to fix!  I convinced him to walk away before the store fell in on us and I told him we'd just tell the cashier.  Our cashier knew exactly what bottles we knocked over because he said it happens several times a day; and no one wants to fix them because they are so impossible to clean up! 

Our two hour rental flew by.  We went back to the shop we parked at and grabbed the kids a Tshirt and some souvieners. 

We went back to our condo, took quick showers and got dressed up for another dinner out.  We decided since the night before was a flop, we'd go back to the highway and eat at a chain restaurant.  Smokey Bones sounded good and it ended up being delicious.  I wish the one back home wouldn't have closed!

We ran into Target, then went back to the strip to check out the night life.  There were several bars open and Kevin wanted a Corona.  I was still disappointed by my bad piña colada the night before so I thought I'd try one more before calling it quits.  This one was perfect!

We were back at the condo by 9 and ready for bed early!