Day 4 St Petes Beach and The Grand Plaza

**ChoppyGirl** · 19 Sep 19, 07:13 PM

Today we were off for a day at St Pete’s Beach and an overnight stay at the Grand Plaza as recommended by Wizzo off the Dibb!

We got up and ready, had breakfast, packed a small suitcase and were on the road by 9:30.

I have a phone contract with EE and have 60 gb of data and paid £10 to use the same data abroad so once we were on the I4 I used google maps to get us to the right place. It connected to the car so was really handy.

I took about 90 minutes to get there. We checked in knowing our room wouldn’t be ready and were given a blue bag with details about the hotel and 2 bottles of water and a voucher to give us a cabana or 2 seats and an umbrella on the beach.

We went to check out the beach and the legendry bar that is Bongos. The place was empty as it wasn’t quite 11:30 so we asked the woman on the podium if we could sit at a table with just a drink rather than at the bar. She said that was ok but I don’t think she told our server who was an older woman and seemed quite put out that we weren’t eating, I didn’t see her problem as we were the only ones there and it wasn’t as if we were taking the table and therefore her tip from someone else.

Me and Paul had a beer, Beth had a water and took a photo to post on facebook!

We then got changed in the loos, sorted out stuff out and went to claim our cabana on the beach. There were only 2 loungers in there and it was $10 for an additional seat but Paul said he didn’t want one as would be in the sea for most of the time. There was a sign on the beach saying no alcohol but Bongo’s had a licence where they would serve it to you in their cabana which turned out to be nice and handy.

I had cocktail from Kevin at the beach bar stand and settled in the for afternoon. Beth was missing the wifi so I upgraded her EE account for the month. We read and spent the afternoon in the lovely warm sea and may have had another cocktail. We had taken frozen bottles of water from the villa so had those too along with a bag of Cheetos!

The sea was lovely - really warm and just the right amount of waves to make it interesting but I lost my sunglasses when I put them on top of my head and a big wave came.

We decided to go in for an early tea as we wanted a prime seat on the beach so went to reception to see if our room was ready as it was gone 4. It was so we sent up, got showered and ready to go out. We had a partial view which we had paid for.

When we got to the hotel I noticed a beach shop opposite so we went over and got me some sunglasses along with a pair for Paul as he had left his in the villa. Over to Bongos which was really quiet and got a seat right at the front.

Beth had coke to drink and me and Paul had a couple of Bud lights which hit the spot. To eat I had the grouper sandwich, Paul the hangover burger and Beth had coconut shrimp as she was envious of mine at the Boathouse. It was all really lovely.

As as were sat there a wedding was being sat up on the beach which we ended up watching as we were still eating. It was quite funny as there was a woman from the hotel organising everything and all were sat down waiting for the bride to appear. A little girl about 5 in a swimming costume just ran up the aisle and the wedding organiser had to try and catch her and was looking for her mum but couldn’t find her. She ‘had words’ but she was just running round everywhere and people were getting annoyed. Eventually after about 15 minutes the mum turned up - said ‘oh sorry’ and took the girl away! I was shocked to think she had been out of her sight for that long and she hadn’t even realised.

The ceremony was lovely and I had a cocktail to celebrate! We wanted to stay until sunset as Paul said it would be 7 but it turned out to be 8 and we were exhausted so went back to the room.

We were debating where to go for breakfast the next morning and saw an IHOP out of the window so decided to go there.

Excitedx4 · 22 Jan 20, 11:39 PM

What a nice relaxing day the beach looks lovely

Tinkermom · 23 Jan 20, 08:12 AM

Oh Bongos brings back some memories 😊

**wizzo** · 23 Jan 20, 05:20 PM

Originally Posted by ChoppyGirl

Today we were off for a day at St Pete’s Beach and an overnight stay at the Grand Plaza as recommended by Wizzo off the Dibb!

You're welcome

You were in bed too early though! You have to be there at Sunset. It's bloody magical

23 Jan 20, 08:12 AM	#3
	23 Jan 20, 08:12 AM Tinkermom Apprentice Imagineer
Tinkermom Apprentice Imagineer Join Date: Aug 14	Oh Bongos brings back some memories 😊 __________________ Dreams are forever - Tinkerbell