Daytona Beach

Day Three

It was overcast and rainy when we got up this morning, so we decide to go down to the boardwalk. The boardwalk in Daytona is only a couple of blocks long and only half of that has game rooms and stuff. The Go-Cart track looks like it's shut down for good and the place that has kiddie rides wasn't open. At one end you go up some steps to this bridge across an access road for cars to get on the beach - that's how you get on the pier. I think you used to be able to continue across the bridge to a bar that we went to with Mike and Rita, BK (before kids). That was a neat place, can't believe they tore it down. I remember they had an old gas pump at the bar. There is a big vacant lot there now that will probably be a big high-rise. Behind the commercial part of the boardwalk is another big vacant lot that is going to be the Boardwalk Hotel.

The whole area was pretty deserted, I guess because of the weather. We played some video games Natalie got a beer and sat out in front of the arcade. By then the sun had come out. We took the kids back to the condo and Natalie and I went back towards the boardwalk and went over the bridge to the Halifax Art Festival. It was held along Beach Street, which fronts on the Inland Waterway. Really nice area, full of old stores straight out of the 50's and 60's. Lot's of bars and restaurants, an old theater and parks along the water. We stayed there a couple of hours and it was actually hot.

It wasn't hot back at the condo. The sun kept going in and out and the wind was still howling. Tommy, Matthew and I got in the ocean for a little while but the water was cold. For dinner that night we ate at Aunt Catfish's Restaurant, over the bridge in Port Orange. It was OK. It didn't help that the waitresses started cleaning up while we were still eating. The salad bar and "fish camp fixins" were great but the entrees were just so,so. I got the Pirates Trio - fried shrimp, scallops and catfish. Tom got catfish cooked three differrent ways. Natalie got a salad. There's a pier behind the place that's pretty nice.

After dinner we went back down to the boardwalk. We were going to park right behind it but there was no one around and it was kind of creepy. We checked out Ocean Walk in the Hilton right behind the boardwalk bandshell. Not much really. After that we wondered around the bandshell for a while then called it a night.