Beach Combing, the Mote Aquarium and Sarasota Jungle Gardens...
Just came across a cool blog post of a family vacation to beautiful Anna Maria Island, and as is usually the case... everyone had a great time!
This particular Anna Maria Island vacation experience was very recent, in March actually. The weather they said was not too hot, and not too cool with a little rain just one day.
Wow, how's that for March ;-)
According to the post, and judging by the ton of pictures posted, they had a great time at their vacation rental, which of course came with pool.
Being located just two blocks from the beach meant they spent a lot of their vacation time on the beach.
Isn't that what Anna Maria Island is all about, heading straight to the beach?
Well, of course not. In fact if you frequent our Anna Maria Island Life blog then you know there is no shortage of things to do while vacationing on Anna Maria Island.
A visit to the Mote Aquarium brought them face to face with some rescued dolphins, a shark tank, manatees, sea turtles and lots of jellyfish.
There were touch tanks for the youngest member of the crew and the... "beautiful jellyfish were mesmerizing."
The first touch tank, they said, had crabs,
urchins, and sea snails. The second touch tank, sting rays that were
so friendly!
"We have them at our science center and they often won't
come too close, but these ones would come right at you!"
"They had a
special sea horse area too - they basically had a hatchery where there
were babies only 3 days old!"
The best part they said where the manatees.
"They were enormous, and I think they were the only animal
there that I had never seen before, which was cool."
Then it was off to the historic Bridge Street area, with their shops and restaurants
as well as an old fishing pier... "We saw jellyfish in the water and
pelicans."
From there it was off to Sarasota Jungle Gardens, a really cool place for kids. They had a great time checking out the exotic birds.
"The next morning we rented a boat for 4 hours and took it all around Anna Maria Sound. It was such a great experience, and we just all had such fun!"
You sure can't argue with that, can you.
Like I said, they posted a ton of great pictures. It's fully accessible and if you are thinking about visiting Anna Maria Island... we recommend you check it out at:
- http://gradyeric.blogspot.com/2010/03/anna-maria-island-trip-part-1.html
- http://gradyeric.blogspot.com/2010/03/anna-maria-island-trip-part-2.html
So all in all it sounds like they had a great trip!
The youngest met some new family and had lots of new experiences like holding a gator, driving a boat and feeding flamingos!
... and as always he just loved the beach and pool.
Sound like they'll be back again next year, but then so would you ;-)
