The Harborage Marina in St Petersburg- is a new place for us to dock. We were lucky to get a slip here, thanks to Jacque calling first. We love St Pete and have stayed downtown on the mooring balls before but they are not available at this time due to construction of the wharf. Harborage is located south of the downtown about a half mile away, just past the SFUSP campus. The marina has a couple hundred slips & is quite protected. The Coast Guard station is across the harbor. We were assigned slips on the farthest pier: F Dock, so we definitely got our exercise. They have floating docks with a concrete pier/sea wall attached. The staff is nice, bathrooms pretty good but the laundry room really wasn't up to par. While we were there, they closed the laundry room, removed the old machines, painted, cleaned and installed new machines-yahoo! We did have to make one run to a laundromat while all the renovating was happening. Wifi was almost nonexistent and we could only get ABC on our TV. Luckily, we had so many visitors to keep us busy, we didn't miss TV.
We enjoyed a fun filled, social month here. Waterford was here with us, the whole month. The first friends we saw were some of our KK family: Martha & John on Marie Louise II who were also docked at the Harborage. Our second night here, Craig & Cheryl stopped on their way to Ft Myers Beach & spent the night with us, on Day Dreams. The next morning, we walked with them to the Farmers Market & then they were on their way, planning on returning to spend a few days with us later on in the month. We biked almost daily-there are great bike trails here, some along the roadway, others on paved paths. We found the Pickle Ball Courts, they were a few miles away but we never played on them: next time.
Our next visitors were Jeri & Jerry, they stayed at a VRBO downtown, a cute apartment above a private residence's detached garage. J&J supplied the first night's dinner with fresh caught Tuna from Jerry's deep sea fishing expedition two days before. Garry & Jacque joined us & we had a delicious grilled tuna dinner with all the fixins, poolside at the marina. We celebrated our 42nd Wedding Anniversary while J&J were visiting, so we splurged and the 6 of us drank cocktails on the rooftop @ The Canopy and dined @ Parkshore grill. J&J had brought their bikes so we did an all day Mural Hunt around town-we were amazed at how many we found-at least 25 of them-all colorful & creative. Another day, J&J and Doug & I hopped on the Central Ave bus which was $2.50/person for all day & rode it all the way past St Pete's Beach to Pass-A-Grille Beach. It was very windy, so we didn't walk much of the beach but we ate lunch @ The Brass Monkey. After riding the bus back, we caught the free trolley to the University & walked back to the Marina just in time to meet our next visitors, Bill & Lisa, some more of our KK family. Bill & Lisa sold Changing Course KK48 in the fall & were still in pursuit of the next perfect boat, so they were in town for the afternoon to see a boat that didn't fit the bill. We ended our visit with J&J by playing a few rousing games of Rummikub. We thoroughly enjoyed their visit and were so glad to see them & we were sorry to see them leave.
A little over a year ago, we had bought our E-bikes in St Petersburg @ The Folding Bike Store & now, we needed to have them tuned up & the software updated. So we left them with the owner for a few days. We put a lot of miles on our feet during those few days-we had a fun evening at Ferg's Sports Bar on Opening day of the Tampa Rays Baseball, listening to a band in the parking lot, no we didn't go to the game. Then we found out on Thursday nights, downtown in the Central Ave/University Way block is where it's happening; the bars & sidewalks were filled with people & live music, we really enjoyed that vibe.
Doug has been dealing with some chronic back pain since February, so we found a Palmer Chiropractic Graduate, Dr Jesso who really helped Doug. She graduated 2 years ago and is in practice with another Palmer Chiropractor who is older and owns the practice. Dr Jesso did some adjusting, cupping, massaging and then showed Doug exactly how to do some helpful strengthening exercises. We were very impressed with her & Doug saw her 3 times.
Craig & Cheryl returned and they stayed in a different VRBO than J&J. It was cute & clean but a lot smaller than J&J's. C&C's was pretty much one room & a bathroom but was fine because they didn't spend much time in it. They rented bikes so we explored more of the city one day and then the next day we rode away from the city and met up with another biker who toured us through the pretty Driftwood neighborhood and then to the Chattaway Bar & Restaurant that his Mom owned. The place is cute & eclectic with pink claw footed bathtubs around the perimeter of the big patio. We had a good lunch there-only wine & beer served with food. We rode along the bike path to the Tropicana Field. Doug had wanted to check out the Hofbrau House so the 4 of us met Garry & Jacque there & had some beer straight from Germany, big warm pretzels & were serenaded by accordion. Our last evening with C&C, we drank & dined at Red Mesa & Garry & Jacque joined us there too. 
We had a day to ourselves with Doug making another visit to Dr. Jesso. Then our dear friends, Tricia & David arrived, without their boat. They stayed downtown in the Hyatt, Lauryl Anne was having work done in Stuart. We were so thrilled that they came to see us. We toured them around town and they rented the city bikes for an afternoon so we could bike through Vinoy Park & along the bay. D&T, G&J & D & I checked out the Friday Night Street Festival & then met up with Martha & John, John's brother & son for dinner @a Vietnamese Restaurant. There were festivals, craft shows & the Farmers Market going on while they were visiting. David & I decided to try the climbing wall @ the Art Festival-David made it to the top lickety split while I only made it halfway. We really enjoyed our visit with them.
One of the many things we love about St Pete is all the museums. During this visit, we toured the James Museum Western Art. Mr & Mrs James of Raymond James Financial have been collecting art from living western artists for years. They have acquired over 3,000 pieces & they wanted to share all of this beauty so they built a beautiful museum out of exported sandstone in St Pete where they reside. The Museum is home to 300 of their pieces, many of these are amazing bronze sculptures. We loved this museum.
In between visitors, Garry & Jacque & Doug & I rode our E-bikes 38 miles roundtrip to Fort DeSota & Park. Most of the bike ride was along really nice paved bike trails with some wooden board walks too. Another reason why we love St Pete.
Our next visitor was another of our dear friends, Esther. She drove from her home in Punta Gorda to spend the day with us. We went to lunch @ the Famous Don Cesar Resort on St Pete Beach & then toured the Sunken Gardens near downtown-a new place for all three of us. It actually had been a sink hole many years ago & a family who owned the land started planting gardens and it has grown into quite a beautiful area with many varieties of trees, plants & flowers. It reminded me of a maze. There were also pink flamingos & large coy fish.
Last friends to visit for the month were 3 of my girlfriends from BG High School: Beth, Beth Ann & Karlyn. We met for dinner with 2 of their guys, Karlyn's husband was traveling so he couldn't be with us. The next day, just the girls met, we reminisced, laughed, walked & ate. Beth & Karlyn stayed at the Hollander Hotel which had a really nice pool & bar. We hope to do this again & maybe get more of the old HS gang to join us.We also celebrated my birthday while here in St Pete. Garry, Jacque, Doug & I went out to dinner & took in more of the sights & sounds of the city.
