A Look Back at 2013 - MAY - Our Honeymoon (May 12th) - MOTHER'S DAY at Clearwater Beach & Epcot

 CLEARWATER BEACH

Mother's Day

We stayed only one night on the gulf coast, but I'm glad we made time to at least go there.  We'll go again in the future I'm sure!  We stayed in the Hilton which was right on the beach.  The view was really nice from our room.  I couldn't believe how much softer and whiter the sand was here!  I loved the blue cabanas lined up on the beach.  Ed and I got a picture together, but it didn't turn out very good.  The beach was just beautiful and I wish we had more time to relax and swim, but we had lots to do.  

It was my very first Mother's Day spent away from the kids.  I didn't realize we'd be on vacation!  Since losing a child, Mother's Day is one of the most difficult days to get through because you don't have one of your children there to celebrate with you.  Oliver must have been thinking of me because while we were walking along the beach, wading in the water, I saw what I thought was something heart shaped coming in on the waves.  It was happening fast and the water was really bubbly, so I quickly reached down and grabbed it.  To my utter AMAZEMENT... it was a shell with a heart inside of it.  It looked like someone paper punched a heart from the center of the shell as you can see in the photo below.  I just started tearing up and KNEW that Oliver wanted me to know that he was with me... especially on Mother's Day.  Just the thought of it throughout the day brought me to tears. 

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 EPCOT

International Flower & Garden Festival

I was so excited to find out that it was going to be the Flower & Garden Festival while we were there visiting!  I brought my nice camera and had so much fun stopping and smelling the roses, along with taking many photos of the gorgeous flowers in bloom!  Every single topiary throughout the park was just stunning!

Ed and me in front of the big 'golf ball', Spaceship Earth.

Even though we had no kids with us on this trip, I still wanted to see the characters.  I'm young at heart and have never seen Daisy out and about on our other trips, so of course I had to take a picture with her!

I couldn't get over all of the vibrant colors of flowers and how they had them arranged!  I was in heaven!

These were outside of The Wonders of Life building.  I loved the lizards hanging out all over the place!  One wanted to climb in Mickey's mouth!  Totally made me think of Oliver.

Buzz Lightyear, in front of the Universe of Energy, Lightning McQueen and Mater.  The boys would have loved seeing these, especially my nephew, Carson.

 *ENGLAND*

Peter Pan, Captain Hook and the alligator.

Winnie the Pooh and friends.

Beauty and the Beast, Cogsworth and Lumiere, Prince Charming and Cinderella

 *FRANCE*

Ed trying some ratatouille for the first time along with a croissant and macaroon.

 *MOROCCO*

I love the architecture and details in the buildings!

*JAPAN*

We met some fellow Iowans here in Japan!  I think they were from Davenport.  The bonsai trees reminded me of Oliver and the toe socks reminded me of my brother, Bryan.  I told Ed he should get some of the sandals!

*The AMERICAN Experience*

Every May during the flower festival they have the Flower Power music series which features bands from the 60's.  We were lucky enough to be there on the day that Herman's Hermits were performing!  He also did a great impersonation of Mick Jagger.  Ed said it was one of the best concerts he'd been to!  I was thinking of my mom the whole time as she listened to Herman's Hermits when she was a teenager. 

"I'm Into Something Good"

"Silhouettes"

"I'm Henry the VIII, I Am"

"There's a Kind of Hush"

"Leaning on a Lamppost"

"Mrs. Brown You've Got a Lovely Daughter"

"Can't You Hear My Heart Beat"

 *ITALY*

Again, the buildings were so pretty and I loved the Lady and the Tramp topiary!

Snow White and the Seven Dwarves

  *CHINA*

*NORWAY*

I hope this isn't the closest to Norway I will ever get!  I love all the trolls and the Maelstrom ride.  The desserts here were wonderful.  I think I was enjoying my unihorn... I mean my cream horn.  I had some lefsa, too, of course!

 *MEXICO*

*GERMANY*

A Look Back at 2013 - MAY - Our Honeymoon (May 11th) - Daytona, Clearwater & Honeymoon Island

 DAY 6 - Daytona Beach, Clearwater & Honeymoon Island


DAYTONA BEACH 

I had spent a good amount of time searching for fun things to do in Daytona Beach and found Zeno's Boardwalk Sweet Shop near the pier and was shocked to see the number of different flavors of taffy they had.  Peanut Butter and Jelly, Candy Corn, Buttered Popcorn and Beer to name a few!  We got a large bag and tried a ton of different flavors!

We walked down the boardwalk and looked around a few shops and got the kids a few souvenirs, some stickers, shells and we got a stone turtle to put on Oliver's headstone since he loved his pet turtle, Hermione.

As we were headed out of town I had to snap a few pictures of the Daytona speedway, even though I'm not a fan of Nascar.  I loved the Mickey Mouse ears on the power lines and we even saw an open truck of oranges on the road. 

 ***

CLEARWATER BEACH

We left Daytona Beach (The Atlantic Ocean) and drove about 3 hours to Clearwater Beach (The Gulf of Mexico).  It was crazy to cross a state in such a small amount of time!  Since we did the cheap time share presentation packages, we thought we'd splurge and spend at least one night in a nice hotel so I found the Hilton Clearwater Beach.  It was our very first time seeing the Gulf of Mexico and it was so beautiful.  The sand was so soft and whiter than the sand on the east coast.  I collected some of each and have it in a jar with some shells I picked up on the beach.

View of the beach from our hotel room.

***

HONEYMOON ISLAND

I wanted to see more of Florida's natural beauty on this trip so I did a lot of searching and found this amazing island off the gulf coast of Florida.  Honeymoon Island is a state park so it isn't loaded up with restaurants and hotels.  Unfortunately it was an overcast day with a high chance of rain, but we went anyways.  It will definitely be a place we visit again in the future!  Even though it was overcast, it was still unbelievably stunning!

The sun was beautiful peeking through the clouds.

We headed over the bridge and paid a few bucks to get into the park and drove to a beach that was full of rocks and broken shells.  I spent a while looking for some shells, while Ed relaxed on a wooden beach side bench.  I loved seeing all of the different types of palm trees on the island as we drove from one beach to another.  Ed found a cool shell and had fun watching the crabs scoot from rock to rock.  

We drove to the other side of the island where the beach was a lot nicer.  Too bad the weather didn't cooperate as I wanted to go swimming in the ocean.  It was really shallow in most areas and I could picture the kids playing there in the future.  The sky looked very ominous, but beautiful.  It was EXTREMELY windy so I had to take of my hat for fear of it flying off my head and into the ocean!  Of course, Honeymoon Island, was the perfect setting for a wedding that was taking place as well as the perfect destination for our honeymoon!

One of my favorite shots!

Tampa Bay in the background.

I loved seeing the rays of sun shining down onto the water.

Tampa Bay in the distance after the storm clouds thinned out.

Stunning sunset over the ocean.  Of course we always thought of Oliver on the Florida beaches.

A bright rainbow against the black sky.

We left Honeymoon Island when the sun was setting and were getting hungry so we drove back to the hotel.  We took a walk down the street and found a small pizza place and ice cream shop to eat at.  We sat outside and talked while people watching and listening to the street musicians.  It was a really fun day!

A Look Back at 2013 - MAY - Our Honeymoon (May 10th) - Daytona Beach

 DAY 5 - Crabby Joe's, Airboat ride, Stormy nights

We received a voucher to Crabby Joe's for going to hear about the time shares.  It was a great day to go because it was so clear out.  As we were sitting at the table, we could feel the building moving with the wind, which was a little bit unnerving!  The windows were open and we could feel the breeze from the ocean.  The color of the water was so gorgeous.  I could really get used to being by the beach! 

After we ate lunch, we drove to Jolly Gator Fish Camp to go on our first air boat ride!  I was nervous because I wasn't sure if I would get seasick from the motion of the boat, but I was fine.  I loved feeling the wind in my hair and seeing Florida from a different viewpoint than the theme parks!  We saw many different birds flying when the boat got near to them.  It was a beautiful day, but it started looking like rain when we were about to leave. 

 I loved how we glided over the water and through the grass.  It was amazing to be able to go where ever we wanted.  It was just Ed and me on the boat with the captain.  We didn't see many alligators, however when we were going up on a grassier area, two huge gators jumped up and made a giant splash right in front of the boat!  The bottom left photo is of an alligator poking his head out and the middle photo is of a baby alligator.  I think there is a white crane or heron in the bottom right.  I loved all the different shades of green we saw.  So beautiful!

Ed and I wanted to go somewhere fun for dinner and so we chose Caribbean Jack's.  I had read that there were bands playing that night on the outside deck and so we thought we'd give it a try.  It started to rain when we pulled up and then it just POURED for several minutes.  Everyone that came in from outside was soaking wet!  The food was pretty good, but I was sad that we missed the opportunity to listen to live music.  As you can see, the decor was pretty fun with the alligator over Ed's head!

We drove back to the hotel we were staying at and sat on the beach watching the storm over the ocean.  By that time the rain had passed and we just watched the lightning over the water.  It was just gorgeous and I was lucky enough to capture some great pictures as it lit up the sky.