Tallahassee and then... motorcycle madness!

We visited Flordia's state capital, Tallahassee, and Jim was thrilled that we encountered 3(!) protests.  It brought back fond memories of his G-20 escapades.

As you can see, not quite the excitement of the

G-20 as these kids and their teachers were marching for public school options...

We toured the inside of the historic capital building (mostly because it was air conditioned and had a cheesy photo op!)

Then it was off to view the campus of Florida State University, home of the Seminoles.  It is an older, campus with elegant buildings and beautiful sorority/fraternity houses.

And of course, a tour of the athletic facilities was in order again!  (Jason, Jim was thinking of you...)

Football Stadium exterior

...and interior

Track facilities where Danny competed!

On the way to Panama City Beach, we stopped for a hike in a semi-tropical forest, where palms and pine trees happily co-exist.

Yikes, is that an alligator in the water??

Click to enlarge.

Must have been, as Jim climbed the tree to escape (or maybe get a better view?)

So, we finally made it to Panama City, where Jim convinced Cel to stay for the night, despite its carnival/midway feel.  Imagine our surprise (Cel)/excitement (Jim) when we checked in and discovered we were just in time for "Thunder Beach" - a huge motorcycle rally.  There were bikers and Harley's everywhere.  Thankfully, they were mostly older, grey hairs with their biker chick wives on the back.  However, we did see our fill of tattoos... are you getting a visual?

Despite the fact that hundreds of huge, throaty Harley's paraded up and down the main drag, we actually had a fantastic room right on the beach with this view out our window.

We had a nice stroll on the beach and watched the magnificent sunset from the patio of our beachfront restaurant.

How's this for our crazy hotel pool?

It was a little safer in the pool as it was a "double red" flag day, meaning the surf and undertow were dangerous and lots of marine life was washing ashore.  Planes were flying overhead pulling banners saying, "Don't swim in the gulf."

Jim almost followed all the rules today!