The Periphery of the Mind

We got up early, left De Soto, and headed southeast. Through the tunnel in Mobile, and along the coast of Florida. The slow, crowded, gaudy coast of Florida. "The Redneck Riviera" as one local put it. Once you get past the Tyndall Air Force Base, traffic and scenery pick up.

We pulled into Saint George Island shortly before 4:00 pm, their time, and had to wait while they got the house ready. It struck me as odd that the place still wasn't ready, seeing as they'd been prepared in the past, but I let it slide. We came back at 4:00 and found that the house still wasn't ready, but they'd let us in anyway. Something about an air conditioning tech needing to do some work on the house. Anyway, we got there and proceeded to unpack our car. Big mistake. Seems that the upstairs AC was busted, and when the tech looked at it he realized he couldn't fix it and didn't know when he'd be able to get the parts to do so.

In the future we will never unpack until we're sure the house is adequate.

So between the Professor yelling at him, and at management, and possibly a few other people who happened by, we were moved to a different house, A Sunny Daze. The only problem we had was that the pool at Sunny Daze was behind the house and thus in the shade, and that meant that the pool wasn't warm enough for swimming until around 2 or so. But that may have been true at Solona, where we initially booked, as well. Also, Sunny Daze lacked almost all of the "down home" touches that Solona had, as well as lacking a grill. Still, we felt Collins Vacation Rentals did right by us, more or less. See, we had to go back the next day and complain that we needed a key for the pool.

And Trina from the front desk.... We know your policy says that your pools have combination or pull locks, but you might assume that in the future your customers know a keyed lock when they see one and that it is your responsibility to contact someone to resolve the problem and not the customers. Anyway, for those reading this, hopefully you'll deal with better staff members than her. And all of the other staff we dealt with were much more helpful and less put off at doing their jobs.

Anyway, we settled down in Sunny Daze and unpacked. After driving almost all day and trudging up several flights of stairs to pack, unpack, and repack, we were ready to get something at a restaurant. In this case we picked BJs Pizza & Subs. Maryanne had some sort of veggie-less Mexican Pizza, and I had a Chicken/Bacon/Pesto/Onion/Pepper pizza. The crust was a thin crackery crust, and the flavor wasn't bad, but we spent close to $40 for two pizzas and drinks. Definately not a good place on your wallet. I do like that you can refill your drinks yourself though; I'd rather walk the two feet and drink as much as I want when I want than feel like I need to leave a tip for somebody who may or may not fill my drink.