Wes & Erica go to Tampa, FL, part 2

December was a trying month (but we don't need to talk about that..), regardless, I am determined to travel on my birthday no matter what, and I wanted to celebrate another completed craft show season, so off to Florida we went!! 🌞 I think we did a little less than we usually do when we travel but we both still enjoyed the trip. We only went to three activities -

Coppertail Brewing Night Market-
Coppertail is a local brewery in Ybor, FL. Every second Friday evening, the brewery opens its back parking lot to crafters and artisans for a night market. This was a really fun event with good customer turnout, Oklahoma breweries take note (and allow RagsReborn to be a vendor 😉). There was a good variety of vendors--about 30-40 of them--and they were all handmade. The weather was amazing - 70℉, cool with no wind. The only weird thing was that not many of the vendors were selling Florida themed stuff. I was surprised there wasn't any tshirts, stickers or any of the other usual crafty items with the state outline of Florida printed on them. There was a local rescue there with a litter of eight-week old boxer/German shepherd puppies. They were so cute in their Christmas bandannas! There was only one food truck at the market (they preferred that everyone eat in the taproom but it was PACKED and I was too hungry to wait in line). The food truck was a pizza one. They made our pizzas to order in a little portable brick oven. We ordered a margherita pizza but it didn't have basil. I instantly didn't like it for that reason, that and the crust was burnt. We also got beers (of course, we were at a brewery!). Wes ordered a Day Swim, a coffee & vanilla porter that was pretty good and tasted as expected. I got the Florida Special, which was just your average blonde beer. Nothing special about the beers but the night market was worth going to.

Tampa Art Museum-
The art museum was pretty good but also really small. It was only one floor and we went through it all in about an hour. The gift shop was bigger and had more interesting stuff than the museum did. LOL Wes really liked the Greek & Roman vessels and other statuettes (above). He liked the use of the color black in the artifacts. My favorite thing at the museum was the mummy. Well, it was only a sarcophagus. When the explorers found it, there was no mummy inside. I think if there is a mummy in a museum, it will always be my favorite part of the museum. The drawings on the sarcophagus were really detailed and told an intricate story but I've forgotten it now.

The special exhibit at the museum was a collection of Haitian voodoo flags. They were much more colorful and bejeweled than I thought they'd be (but I know literally nothing about Haitian culture or voodoo so who am I to judge). All of the flags were decorated using either beads or sequins. Many of them depicted St. Jacques who was the leader of the Haitian revolution.

The Florida Aquarium-
The aquarium was amazing and completely worth going to if you ever are in Tampa. The place was gigantic with eight different areas to explore. There was a really good variety of animals and sea life to view. We started in the wetlands section and wandered all the way through to the "Dragons of the Sea" section (my favorite), we skipped the splash pad and 4-D movie theater even though they were included in our ticket. We saw everything from birds to jelly fish to lemurs to lobsters. The wetlands section had all of the birds flying free instead of in cages, which I thought was rad even if we got splashed by a hooded merganser duck several times (like literally each time he swam by us) and almost got shat on by a roseate spoonbill bird. LOL Wes's favorite animal - the snowy egret bird - was in the wetlands, too.

A lot of the exhibits were interactive. I got to "pet" a jelly fish, star fish and a sea anemone. I would have also touched a stingray but he didn't swim close enough to me. An aquarium worker randomly brought out a penguin for us to see (but not touch). The aquarium has a few penguins but they aren't on display, yet. They live in the back for now. My favorite creature (and probably my new favorite animal, sorry okapi) was the leafy seadragon. This thing looks insane and astounding at the same time. It was a medium sized seahorse with branches growing out of it! Just look at it!! Extraordinary!

So that's a wrap for Tampa. If you go, try to go on the second Friday of the month so you can visit the night market. Plan to spend several hours at the aquarium (we probably spent 3-4 hours there). We went on a Monday so it wasn't crowded. You can probably skip the art museum. I didn't mention it but we also took a stroll along the Riverwalk. It was a nice two-mile walk. You start at the art museum and end up at Armatage Works. We spent a day in St. Petersburg as well, more on that next week!

Wes & Erica go to Tampa, FL, part 1

Yes, this blog post will be about food. LOL

For my birthday trip this year, I decided that Wes & I should go to Florida... for three reasons: The Dalí Museum, Cuban food and seafood. We ate plenty of Cuban food and had a fantastic time at the museum, but we didn't get any seafood. 😔 Well, two out of three ain't bad. I had actually picked out a highly rated seafood place (Shells Seafood Restaurant) but we never made it. I think we ate too much at one of our many other stops and couldn't stomach another restaurant. LOL Since food is my main reason for travelling, this blog post will be a rundown of all the places we ate at.

La Segunda Bakery-
This place was so good, we actually went there twice! The original bakery is in Ybor and it would have been neat to eat at that location, but we chose the Tampa location instead because it was within walking distance from the hotel. The first time, we went for breakfast. I got the avocado toast (with adorable itty bitty avocados🥑) with a shortbread cookie with guava filling center and Wes got a breakfast sandwich (with mild garlicy chorizo instead of the spicy kind) with a coconut cannoli. We both ordered cafe con leche. I asked for sugar in mine which turned out to be a sort-of-bad idea because it was too sweet. The coffee was really good though, darker than what cafes serve here in Oklahoma. The second time we went was for lunch. I got a Cubano (which was insanely meaty with "special sauce"- a creamy blend of mustard & mayonnaise that I liked better than regular mustard) with a guava turnover and Wes got oatmeal (I know, weirdo) with flan and cold brew. He said the cold brew was good because there wasn't very much milk or sugar in it, which means I probably wouldn't have enjoyed it. LOL I ordered a Jupiña soda. It was supposed to be pineapple flavored but I thought it tasted more like peach or guava. No complaints though. I loved my dessert but Wes wasn't a fan of his flan. He said the texture was off due to the settled "crust" part on the bottom.

Armature Works-
Armature Works is a HUGE food court with local culinary pop-ups, shops and bars. There was a wide variety of food, from tacos to ice cream to burgers. I wish we could have spent an entire day here to eat but unfortunately, we weren't even hungry when we came here. We were walking along the Riverwalk in Tampa after breakfast and came upon it. It was really nice weather that day, sunny with a slight breeze. The place had a large outdoor area, with a patio and lawn games, and we witnessed an engagement (she said yes). We stopped in for coffee at Union. Wes got the nitro cold brew and I got the matcha latte, which wasn't sweetened but I surprisingly still liked it.

Matoi Korean & Sushi-
We had my birthday dinner here. It wasn't on the itinerary (yes, I research and scout out several restaurants before we travel because food is the most important part) but I'm glad we found it. It was within walking distance from the hotel and we saw it the previous morning when we were walking to La Segunda. We ordered the soft shelled crab for starters and then I got sushi for dinner and Wes got kimchi chigae (spicy soup with pork, tofu and kimchi). The sushi was super fresh. 🍣🦀😋I didn't finish it all so we took the remainder to the hotel. I ate it a day later for a snack and it was still good! In my experience, leftover sushi has never been a good idea. The soft shell crab was also delicious. We ate at 4pm because we skipped lunch that day. We were one of the only customers there so the service was amazing. I'm sure that the service is top notch even when its busy, too.

La Teresita-
This was our last meal on our trip. La Teresita is a local staple in Tampa and literally everyone recommends it. Our Uber driver told us he'd give us a five-star rating because we chose a good restaurant for dinner. Hahaha! The portions are very generous and the prices are cheap. We were welcomed with Cuban bread; for dinner I had rice with squid & garbanzo soup (both of which I thoroughly enjoyed, minus the onions though... there were way too many onions!) and Wes had pork chunks with rice and fries. The pork was marinated in lime & spices and was very tender. This might have been my favorite meal. But the sushi was also really really good. And the guava turnover was amazing. Okay, I guess I liked it all! LOL

All this food is making me hungry, and rightly so. Its dinner time! I have to stop to cook dinner but next week, I'll post about all of the touristy stuff we did in Tampa. Until then...