Clearwater, Florida

What's to say about Cleaewater, Florida?
Well for one it's a very fun touristy beach town, typical food and drinks we're not pocket gouging to say the least. Drinks ranged in the $6-$9 range and were fair pours to say the least. Food prices ranged from appetizers $6-$8 and dinners $9-$12 depending on where you decide to eat. Our hotel ran about $130 a night, so now on to the fun stuff!

We awaken in our hotel room at the Sta 'N Pla Marina Resort. It's a quaint little place with two locations about 50 feet from each other. Sami described it as A cross between Miami Vice meets Melrose Place with pools in the middle. Free Wifi with a sting connection. The bed was very comfortable with super soft pillows, couch, coffee table, coffee maker and coffee, mini fridge and well you get the idea. Most of all it was very clean and relaxing.

Word to the wise, bring a HDMI cable and a laptop so you can patch right into the TV to play tunes or watch whatever you care to as we did!

We set off to for our meal of the day and found Frenchy's Beach Bar and grill to be a cool spot to hit. Staff was ultra friendly and we decided upon fried calamari. It was a lightly battered with an assortment of shapes and sizes. Sami had the Long Island Ice Tea and I a schooled top shelf margarita.
When the food arrived their cocktail sauce was bland to say the least but once we got the garlic aioli sauce, that food was going down quickly.

Struck up a conversation with a young couple, Chris and Courtney who were day visiting. When we first sat down they were having a lovers quarrel, but not long after Sami applied her compassionate charm and relationship advice they calmed becoming quite jovial. After my second margarita I was quite buzzed, yet upon ordering a third I felt it was time to entertain them with card and coin magic. Chris seemed to be an "expert" on my magic, but I broke through his gruff exterior and humorist him. Courtney on the other had repeatedly expressed her mind being blown. All and all they were quite adorable. Paying our bill we set out to the beach.

The beach sand was soft and white, little cabana umbrellas lined the shore as people played, sunbathed and soaked in the atmosphere. There's a seagull on these shores that literally enjoy hovering over you and laugh. We decided to call the Mocking Gulls! Since I had contacted Sunsets on Pier 60, it's an organization that puts on busker entertainment and vendors for the night every day 2 hours before sunset and 2 hours afterwards. (Those who're entertainers interested in performing, contact dallasthefireguy@gmail.com )
Assessing the scenario for my shows the next night we headed off to get water and bathroom as my stomach was still upset from the fast food at St. Louis airport.

We stopped at Duffy's Bar along the market strip, we ordered Corona for the gal and I had a Heineken with a shot of Cuervo. DO NOT ORDER SHOTS HERE because they were ridiculously short. We left after I shared some rope magic with a family that has three daughters.

Since this blog site is called Find Penguins, we felt it's only apropos to seek out a penguin along the way. Stopping into a boutique called Bags and Baubles I will let Sami take it from here. Sami: Purses and bling with lots of shiny things! A very beautiful selection of hand bags and jewelry, so of course a cool Bettina ring and silver thumb ring was purchased along with a gift for my friend Kelly. The gentleman working the counter was sweet and funny saying we had a slim chance finding a penguin there or anywhere near laughing about our mission. But we looked anyways.

Needing other provisions we set out to get them for the rest of our trip, Ziplock baggies, Moonshine....you know, the important stuff! Low and behold Sage found our first penguin, her name is Waddles and she was saved from the confines of Mr. Walgreens shop of corporate plenty. Sage also surprised me with a set of Bettina ear rings that have a pearl with sea shells.

We went back towards our room for some napping.Read more