November 2011 - Road Trip--Pearl Cruise part 3

Friday, 11/25/11

We were up about 6am, showered, dressed and down to breakfast.  Mark got priority club package – consisted of freebies in the snack room – he got diet coke & peanut butter crackers for the road. I filled up by coffee cup and grabbed a couple of bananas & muffins for am snack later.  Got packed up and in the car by 8:30am!   Cost = $0.00 !! Love priority club points!  J

            We stopped in Waterboro, South Carolina at 10am at a Stucky’s for gas / caffeine / potty break.  Everyone was soo friendly there! Even other customers were “Good Mawnin” and smiling! I brought in my travel mug to fill w/ coffee and Mark grabbed a Diet Coke. There was no charge on my coffee! Huh. Maybe because I brought my own cup, it was free? Anyway we loved that!  LOL

            11:30 am Savannah, Georgia – HELLLO SAVANNAH! Great!! Awesome bridge we passed over on the way in. 

         We found the ‘Lady & Sons’ restaurant with little difficulty. We snagged a great parking spot less than a block away. Saw the infamous Hostess stand outside. ( Hostess stand opens @ 9:30 am to get a seating number. First come, first served. ) Assumed that there would be a long wait but thought I would ask anyway. There was NO LINE! I asked how long the wait was. There is NO WAITING!!  You can go right in! Here is your number (little piece of paper) and go straight up to 3^rd floor. WOW. I was amazed!

We were seated right away – our waiter was Hector. He was awesome! We asked if it was okay to take pictures. He said SURE! This is like Disney for adults!  LOL  He took a photo of us, and let us take a photo of him, too!

They had a buffet available, but we chose to eat off the menu. First we got bread service – a southern biscuit and what seemed to be a deep fried small pancake.

Mark ordered the pulled pork sandwich & Key Lime Pie – because he had watched Paula make the Key Lime Pie. Hector told us a little story about the pie. There was some man up from Key West, who had always won the local key lime pie contest there. He ate Paula’s Key Lime Pie, and stated that he was glad she did not enter his contest, as she would win. He determined that it was the ground pecans in her crust that made the pie so good!

 I had chicken salad on pumpernickel and Pecan Pie (hey, I’m in Georgia for crying out loud, how can I NOT have PECAN pie??) There were also fried green tomatoes on the side! Yummmmmmy! Price = $39.53

We left and walked past hostess stand on the way to the gift shop next door. Now, there was a line And a 2.5 hr wait! Wow, didn’t we time that great?!?! We did the store and found a couple of magnets for souvenirs.

            3:30pm stop at Burger King for a bathroom break and a drink. Mark wanted a Strawberry milkshake. Well, they had to get a new bag of shake mix. A guy brought out the large bag and put it on the counter. The girl says “What,  I can’t fill that!” Was fun to watch the team interact with each other! LOL We thought it was funny, anyway. Guess you had to be there.  I got coffee – big surprise, right?! I also got a small soft serve ice cream cone. The cone itself was THE freshest regular cone I have EVER had. Usually they all taste a little stale to me, and there is not that great crunch to it. This one was awesome! Okay, I’m easily impressed.

           

           4:30pm – Daytona Beach! We wanted to see the NASCAR Track – maybe get a few photos of the gate, etc. Well. They were having an ‘old / classic’ car show and let me tell you there were a LOT of old cars around. There were 4 lanes of traffic on each side of the road. It took us over 1.5 hrs just to drive a couple miles past the speedway and turn around to get back on the highway! We did get some shots of the speedway and some old cars. People were friendly for the most part – chatted through open windows to people in the next lanes. Reminded us of the “Strip” in Vegas, how crazy jammed with traffic that was. It was interesting!

           

            6:45pm Melbourne, Florida – Waffle House dinner stop. First time we’ve been here. See them all over down south (along with Huddle House, where we learned is more of a family type restaurant).    We sat at the counter. I had pork chops, with ‘smothered & covered hash browns’, w/ salad. Mark had patty melt & hash browns. Had a nice chat w/ server and the cook. (who we watched prepare our meals on the drill – “Redneck Teppanyaki!” ) The cook was older, small framed,  without a single tooth in his mouth. He had a cell phone in his back pocket, that kept going off. The ring tone was “Tequila!” Too funny. Was a nice stop for dinner at a old fashioned diner. Price $20.22 our most expensive yet – besides Paula Deen’s!.  Back on the road about 7:15pm – eta to MIAMI was 9:40pm.

        

   

          10pm (ish)  We finally got to room. Had difficulty finding this place! Staybridge Suites in Doral, Florida. It was behind the Holiday Inn, and the sign on the road was not lit up in a way that you could read it. Once you knew it was there – no problem! Great room!! 2 room suite – large 2 room bathroom – tub/toilet in one room, sink & large closet in next. King Bedroom w/ tv. Living area / kitchenette w/ counter & chairs and a balcony! Nice room. Very comfy and roomy. They also had a great breakfast room – free.  It was very nice to finally arrive and be able to just relax a bit.  Photos will be on next post.