Friday, April 10, 2009

Vacation, All I Ever Wanted...

Sharkey and I recently returned from 10 days of "vacation-y" bliss. We did the old fashioned drive and see the country trip. We got in the car, I put on my iTunes Playlist entitled "70's Leaning on the Backseat" and we were off to the south serenaded by some retro driving music:



We made stops in Reston (Virginia), Raleigh (North Carolina), Hilton Head Island (South Carolina), Savannah (Georgia), and St. Augustine (Florida) before reaching our final destination, Clearwater (Florida).

Here are some photo snippets of some of the things we did and saw:

Hilton Head:

This is the first Original Pancake House I have seen since I lived in Bend, Oregon. They have super yummy food. So we went there for breakfast. If you never tried one and have one nearby, go for it. I highly recommend it.

The Original Pancake House

St. Augustine:

St. Augustine Cross

Clearwater:

Our main destination was to see the Phillies play a preseason game in Clearwater. We watched them trounce the Houston Astros 13-3. It was awesome!

CLEARWATER3

CLEARWATER2

CLEARWATER_MARRIOTT

We had breakfast at the same place the Phillies get their food from the next morning, Lenny's:

Lenny's, Clearwater

Orlando:

For her birthday, Sharkey wanted to indoor skydive. I am typically up for anything, but I had to overcome a bit to get myself to do it. Especially after seeing the warning sign on the 2nd floor:

SkyVenture_Warning

Riiight.... I have dislocated my right shoulder 3x and had a titanium/stainless steel screw inserted into it to keep it from going out. So this sign really did apply to me. But I felt like I'd regret it if I didn't try, and hey getting injured while indoor sky diving is "manly" high testosterone acceptable, so I did it. It was a blast...


I Believe I Can Fly

Afterward we went to Downtown Disney for a lovely dinner at McDonald's and had one of these babies for dessert at Girardelli's Ice Cream Shoppe:

Girardelli Hot Fudge Sundae


We went to Disney Hollywood studios the 2nd day we were in Orlando. We went there 45 minutes before the park opened so we could be the first in line for the new ride, Toy Story: Midway Mania.

Toy Story Mania

This is the reason for 6am wakeup!

We were able to ride it 3x for the day. It was great!!

JP vs. Sharkey

Hollywood Studios was very relaxing and we had an afternoon cupcake / rice krispy treat break, which produced this euphoric look on my wife's face:

Sharkey post Rice Krispy Treat

We both shared sort of the same look. And while we did a lot of driving and had a lot of stops, it was a great trip!

5 comments:

Kranki said...

That look, the look you get after a too delicious for words special treat? I call it the Yum Yum Look.

Sharkey said...

I think I look more tired than euphoric. What I wouldn't give for one of those sundaes right now!

Bogart said...

I love me some Spring Training Baseball!!!

Glad to hear you had a good time.

WILLIAM said...

That looks like a great time.

JP said...

kranki I like that. I'm going to have to use that moving forward. I'll make sure to give you props!

sharkey We can go back for my 40th for one Honey!

bogart 1st time for us to go to Spring Training. Definitely will not be the last. It was awesome!

william Word, true dat, dawg!