Our first vacation together started VERRRRY early. Our plane took off at 6:40 AM so my mom dropped us off at BWI around 5:30 AM. I love airports so I didn't mind having some extra time to wander around. We looked in the few shops that were open and were amazed by the bars that were already serving beer before dawn. Clearly, we needed some coffee so we grabbed some pretty good caramel lattes. Antonio also insisted we stop by McDonald's for breakfast. I had a small muffin in my purse so I did NOT intend to get anything and Mickey D's. I was not prepared, however, for the Sausage McGriddle. For those of you who have never tried this breakfast sandwich, keep it that way. It is probably about 5,000 calories but incredibly delicious, and affordable too at only $1.50. Needless to say, I ate one for breakfast with my super healthy latte. After my mini pig out, we were off!We had a layover in Atlanta which was very exciting because I love Georgia! We didn't have much time there though before we were in the air again. Antonio got me a window seat on every flight because he loves me and knows I love looking out the window. The clouds are just cool ok? Anyway, we landed in Florida around 10:45 AM and were on our way over the bridge to the island! I really loved that we could refer to our home for the week as "The Island". One day, I want to refer to my permanent home as "The Island", even if it's just Kent Island, MD.
Where we were staying was actually much nicer than we antici
pated. We had a big bedroom with a couch and fire place as well as a kitchen and living room area. It was called the Hibiscus and I fell in love immediately. We had a dishwasher (which Antonio later overflowed...) and a grill (which Antonio later used to cook us delicious steaks for dinner!) We even had a real lime tree outside the door! As soon as we got to our condo, we opened our suitcases so that we could head straight for the beach. After a short detour involving an un-intentionally opened bottle of sunscreen, we were in our suits and walking to the beach.
Now, let me explain to you that this was the first time EVER that I was able to see clear, see-through, blue ocean water. It was the COOLEST THING I'VE EVER SEEN! There were little fishies swimming all over but they didn't bother you at all - they just swam away. Even huge schools of fishies just parted around wherever you were standind or walking. We even found a bunch of sand dollars and some really awesome shells! In the interest of time, I will not detail every visit to the beach we had, as we went every day, at least for a couple of hours. I will say, however, that it was absolutely AMAZING. I like to consider myself a bit of a beach expert, but this held no comparison to anything I've ever seen before in my life.
After the beach, we traveled by bus to the Publix and got food for the week. That night, I cooked Captain Crunch Chicken and Cinnamon Sweet Potatoes for dinner. I was a little nervous since Antonio usually does the cooking. It all turned out really great though! We knew that since we were on the Western Coast of FL the sunsets would be incredible so we headed out to the beach to watch it. There were a ton of people there, swimming, drinking, playing catch - it was fantastic. Again in the interest of time, I will not dicusss every sunset we saw, since we watched one every night we were there, even on rainy nights. They were the most beautiful things I've seen in a long time. I took at least 50 pictures of them and just can't decide which ones I think are the best so I'll just give you a few:
The village was only about 2 blocks from where we were staying and had a to
n of stuff to do and cute shops to browse. We happened upon a small bar called Siesta Key Oyster Bar (SKOB) that had some good live music on the outdoor deck. They were also having a 2 for 1 special on beer that night so it was a good place to hang out on our first night in FL. The crowd at SKOB was markedly older and a little snooty but we still had a great time. The bar lets tourists write on dollar bills and then they staple them up all over the ceiling and walls of the bar. We, of course, had to waste a dollar on this, in order to leave our mark on SK forever.The next day, we discovered Daquiri Deck, which was suggested to us by our friends Kerry and Cole and was AMAZING. It was an outdoor bar/restaurant on (duh) and huge covered deck! They had 14 different daquiri flavors and a TON of different combinations of those flavors with cute names includi
ng Kryptonite (green mango and electric lemonade), Mandango (mango and strawberry), and Kazoo (electric lemonade and purple haze). It was definitely our favorite place by far. We went there at least 4 times during out stay - including 2 happy hour (2 for 1 daquiris, uh HELLO!) visits.During our first visit, we ordered Gator Bites, which were deep fried pieces of alligator tail. I must admit, I was a little apprehensive about eating real alligator. I mean, I had heard of this "delicacy" being popular in the south, but I just didn't know. Alligator skin seems kind of...hard. When on vacation, though, I think it's really fun to try the regional specialties and other strange foods. It turned out they were amazing! They tasted a lot like fried clam strips to me, even though Antonio swore it was more like chicke
n. They were also served with a "caribbean dipping sauce" that was sort of like a tangy, spicy thousand island dressing. Later in the week, we also tried Conch Fritters. They were basically baby crab cakes but made with conch (you know the shell you're supposed to hold up and hear the ocean in? Yeah, the animal that lives inside there.) They were also served with the same yummy sauce, but I definitely preferred the Alligator. The conch was very tough, but tasty nonetheless.When we weren't lounging on the white sand beach or admiring the orangey pink sunsets, we spent a large majority of the week wandering the streets of SK Village and taking in the nightlife. There was a TON os great live music and we had a great time just sipping beers and listening. We went to one bar on Reggae Night, which was pretty fun, even though there were a lot of cougars and creepers there. One place th
at had great music was called the The Hub. It was a Baja/Mexican type restaurant with some pretty great food. I especially enjoyed the lobster bisque; I had it 3 times. Since we were at a mexican restaurant, I really wanted to have a margarita. There was one problem: I HATE tequila. I mean despise it. But, the recipe on the menu called for all kinds of great ingredients including agave nectar, so I decided to risk being called an idiot and ask the bartendar if she could make me one with vodka instead - and she did! It was amazing! One night, we found out that The Hub also served a Sunday brunch buffet with live music. We decided to check it out the next morning before traveling to Point of Rocks for snorkeling. When we got there, we heard an amazing sound: STEEL DRUMS! Antonio and I both think steel drums are really cool and love listening to them. The drummer played "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" which is my FAVORITE, and "Under the Sea" from the Little Mermaid and even let Antonio try playing the drums for a few minutes. He didn't do a great job but he said it was still fun.By the way, you may be wondering why I don't have pictures of our snorkeling. Well, that would be because snorkeling was a gigantic failure. The waves were too rough, the water was cloudy and dirty, there were a ton of scary rocks under the surface, the gear we rented sucked and broke, AND I got really scared and freaked out a little bit. We might try again next year.
All in all, we had a really amazing week. We ate too much, drank too much, spent too much, and tanned too much. It was so relaxing to be able to just wander to the beach, or to a bar or restaurant in the afternoon, or to just take a nap after dinner. Watching the sunsets made me feel so lucky to be able to see such a beautiful place in my lifetime. It was also interesting to spend the week with Antonio. It was the longest period of time we've spent alone and, for the most part, it was so fun. I'm sure that next year will be even better.
