Vacation - day 4 (night; broadway at the beach)

Last night (Wednesday) we decided to check out the 'Broadway At the Beach' place we'd heard about it. It was kind of like the Sawgrass Mills Mall in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, that we'd went to several years ago... only bigger. Man, it was huge. We didn't even know about it and some random guy on the street told us about it. We ate supper at the Hard Rock Cafe (which was really good, btw). There was a band just starting to play when we left. There were all kinds of night clubs and restaurants and stores and rides and people out the wazoo. We walked around there for quite awhile. It was really easy to get to. Just go north from our hotel to 21st Ave, take a left and go to Robert Grissom Parkway. It was maybe 10 minutes. Here is a pic of me standing outside the Stupid Factory. I knew stupid people came from somewhere.

After that we came back to the hotel and headed to the boardwalk. There were supposed to be fireworks, but it was really, really windy, so we thought maybe there wouldn't be. But there were tons of people, so we hung out on the boardwalk. We finally decided to head down a little farther - by the Oceanside Bar and Grill we ate at earlier - and there were THREE bands playing within about 50 feet of one another. One at the Bowery (where Alabama played from 1993 to 2000), one at the Oceanside, and one on a stage between the two places (that are next door to one another). We watched the outside band, and pretty soon they lit off the fireworks in the distance right over their heads. That was kinda neat.

After they were done we walked up and down the road where all the shops are, and a constant and steady stream of people are always walking. We finally headed up to our room around 11 pm or so and sat out on the balcony and just watched the waves roll in. There seemed to be a lot of people still walking the beach, so about 1 am we decided to head down and take a stroll ourselves. I couldn't believe how many people were still out on the street. They were still shooting people up in the big slingshot thing across the street from our hotel. They get $50 every time they shoot people in the air (it's kind of like bungie jumping, only they shoot you up from the ground), and there are people on it all day and all night. Anyway, we walked up and down the beach for awhile, then went back and called it a day about 2 am.

Today there were supposed to be thunderstorms so we thought we would drive around or go back to Broadway at the Beach, but it's actually nice and sunny and hot again. So, what the heck, I think we'll head back to the beach. It's our last day here.