My birthday turned out greater than expected! :) I was
feeling better a few weeks ago in a long time so we packed up to stay over night
in Plant City about an hour away from where we live in Clearwater. The tea house
had a large board outside so when we saw it, it said "Happy Birthday
Diane!" How neat was that! (See photo.)
Inside the absolutely delightful tea house, the Camellia Rose, they had our
names on little ceramic holders and gave us both hats, one feminine one for me
and a masculine hat for Ed. The tea goodies were on a three tier serving plate
and one of them was a swan pastry filled with flavored whipped cream. Yum! The
photos enclosed show various views inside the tea house. Also a photo of our
waitress. You can see what a lovely place it was.
We talked to the owner afterwards so that was interesting. She knew all about
the Biltmore so that was great so we told her who we were and what we did to
help save it.
Then we walked around the antique stores afterwards. A woman recommended "The
Red Rose Inn" to stay overnight and have a great dinner so we went there and
boy, a WONDERFUL place! Funny because my symbol on my merchandise is a long
stem red rose and the owner, a woman, has red roses all over the place! Her
style was kind of "upscale" with a European type flair, dark wood, wonderful
ambiance, my kind of place! lol There are various photos of the motel
enclosed. Also note the interesting photo of the towels carefully arranged in
the lobby bathroom!
I had the BEST veal marsala anywhere, deep rich sauce and their bread and butter
the BEST ever too! Wow, what a great meal, wine of course. (See photo.) Ed had
some calamari (fried squid) At the end of the meal the waitress brought a slice
of delicious chocolate cake with chocolate mouse between the layers and she
wrote "Happy Birthday" on the plate in red raspberry sauce so that was very
pretty. (See photo.) Then she also brought a long stem red rose for me! (see
photo). What a great birthday!
They had live music, a few singers and it was single's night there so must have
been a few hundred people there, mainly middle and older age there, dancing the
night away and mingling. (see photo) It was VERY festive for my birthday!!
For the great $59 price tag (a former Ramada Inn) it also included a FREE hot
breakfast buffet in a lovely dining room, plush kind of furnishing with plates
from the movie Gone with the Wind near the coffee urn so lots of style among the
rich dark wood furnishings. (see photo)
The next day we went to a little town called Bartow, the seat of one of our
counties and went to a wonderful historical museum. They had info on a man who
lived to be 134 years of age! (see photo) He had his own little store until the
age of 103, can you imagine that! He was a Black man and came over from Africa,
tricked when he was a boy that there were "pancakes" on trees in America and
then of course they took him to be a slave for years. But he wound up doing a
lot of things later on in his life, different jobs after being freed. Wonderful
story.
The second photo of the Bartow trip is a "motor boat" so to speak, foot
powered! Look carefully to see how they used it in a small little boat for one
or two people. How interesting is that one!
The last three photos are from a restaurant on the way home between Tampa and
Clearwater, Lanyards or something like that. Excellent crab cake and what a
beautiful waterview from our window :) Definitely want to go back there!
Anyway just a wonderful trip! :)
Diane
