We moved to St.Petersburg by bus. First, we visited The Pier which is near Holiday Inn Heritage Hotel where we were going to stay for about 10 days. The building was far away from the meaning of the word 'pier,' because it was a resort area extendedninto the sea. We took shuttle for about a half mile to go there, to find out it was a huge 5-storied building. There were fast food shops, restaurants, souvenir shops, observation and so on, and a lot of visitors were there. It was very hot for us that day, too. The high temperature was around 86F or so, but it wasn't humid unlike in the summer in Japan. I heard that it was so because of a dry season. I also heard that it is incredibly hot, and that heavy rain fall almost every day in the rainy season in summer.
Next, we went over the Sunshine Skyway Bridge that leads to Sarasota. Looking at the bridge from far away, it is just a beautiful bridge. In fact, it is a highway of 4 lanes for each direction. We felt so nice to go up and down the bridge by bus.
We checked in the Holiday Inn Heritage Hotel in St.Petersburg. As we were supposed to have dinner by group of 7 or 8 people, my group went to a restaurant near the hotel. Our team leader, our tour conductor Mr.K, and our translator Ms.Y joined to us. I had a chicken pie for dinner, but it was much bigger than I expected. The stomachs of American people seem so large. By the way, if you order a large coke in McDonald's, about1-liter glass shows up, while a half liter is usually served in Japan.
Next day, October 15, our group walked around St. Petersburg. As a member eagerly wanted to visit Salvador Dali Museum, we walked toward the museum. On our way, we stepped into a pizza restaurant. I ordered two pieces of 18" pizza, to find out they were too much for me when I began to eat a piece. But I ate them all ! Before we arrive at the museum, we saw the sea on our left. We also saw a yacht harbor. When we arrived, a couple came to us, telling 'Shall I take your pictures ?' I thanked them and let them so. Then I took their pictures, too. During that time I talked with them. They told us that they moved from the State of Washington to St.Petersburg just a week before, and that the man moved around the US as many as 18 times ! Their English pronunciation was very easy for me to listen to.
We finally arrived at Dali Museum. We enjoyed a lot of nice drawings inside, although photographs were prohibited. When I came back to Japan, I asked the fine arts teacher of my school if she knows Dali. She said Dali was highly famous. I was ashamed to hear that because I only knew the name. On our way back, I took my picture in front of the sign of USF at St.Petersburg. Also, we found a very wonderful house surrounded by palm trees (in fact, it was an inn). We were saying 'I want to live in such a house !' After we reached our hotel, I was looking at a city map to find out the sushi restaurant named (Haiku Sushi' that we could not find in the phone book before. My roommate Mr.Y and me visited there to check the place and business hours. We did this because we had a teacher saying he couldn't live any more without Japanese food.
That night all the teachers of our team went out to a restaurant that serves crab, to cheer ourselves up for school visits beginning from the next day. Although the restaurant was beautiful looking from outside, the crab which was served was not very big. We also had a hard time in eating it, because we didn't have a special fork to eat crab which we use in Japan.
After we came back to the hotel, I found an interesting TV program named 'Who Wants to be Millionnaire?' Guess what ? The whole idea, contents, and even lightning were exactly the same with the one broadcasted in Japan ! But there was a big difference...the amount of the money for the prize. In Japanese program, the highest prize was 10 million yen, which is $100,000. I couldn't stop laughing because even the presenter looked like the man who shows up in the Japanese TV program !
