Feb 8 2012 Tampa ,Florida

The repair work on the bus ended up taking 3 days, so we spent 4 nights in the parking lot of Cummings. We had to leave by 730 am and could not come back to the bus till 430 pm. We ended up doing a lot of sight seeing in Tampa. There is  a lot to see. We probably would not have taken the time to come to the city if it weren’t for the bus repairs

Bird of paradise. Guess I spent too many winters in Colorado, seeing flowers in the winter is cool. The Florida Aquarium, with a huge manta ray out front.

a real ray in the petty tank. We petted them. They are really cute, they look like birds flying, but they are in the water. I am not sure what this pink fish is, some kind of coral reef fish.

Jellies and a leafy sea horse

A lion fish. They are an invasive species here. Their spines are poisonous and they are eating the local fauna. They have no limit on catching them and I guess they taste pretty good. The water lab at the aquarium.

Giant eel fountain in the children's water park outside. Penguin slippers that I did not buy John. He was very happy.

USS American Victory- a WWII ship. This structure is a memory garden for the Seminole Indians who were ‘relocated’ out of Florida by the white men.  It is on the river walk down town. We walked many miles, it was a beautiful day.

A metal sculpture-Nemo on Wheaties on the river walk.  This pirate ship is the Jose Gasparilla in front of the convention center. He was pirate who pillaged the area. They now have a Gasparilla festival each year. The ship with many other boats sail into the harbor, recreates the famous battle and then the mayor of the city comes to the docks and present him with the key to the city and then there is parade and street fair and ‘piratechnic’ show.

Here is the paper the week of the festival. We missed it by a week. The Tampa skyline

More flowers, hibiscus and ferns

bougainvillea, inside to the trolley. You can ride trolley cars all over Tampa

Columbia Restaurant. It was covered with really colorful tile.

More tile and the inside of the restaurant

Our first course was tapas. We had Chorizo Espanola, a crab, shrimp, artichoke dip and stuffed pepita peppers, then we had a Cuban combination-pork, bolita, empanada, yucca root, plantains, black beans and yellow rice.

Sunset over Ybor City