Sunny St. Petersburg FL - murals and munchies at Love Food Café = many smiles

On a beautiful mid-February day, it was cool outside and besides we didn't have enough time to hit the beaches, but definitely wanted to see the Salvador Dali Museum and the murals all around this town. There's beaches all up and down the Sunshine State, right?

I don't know when it all started but there are dozens of murals everywhere (map) and even though I know they are everywhere around Chicago too, I simply never get tired of exuberant street art like this (another map).

We'd covered a lot of distance for a couple of days to reach St. Pete, and had another big day of driving ahead (to Labelle FL to surprise my folks), so mural-gazing made for a fun and relaxing day. All afternoon it sounded like we were watching fireworks: ooh... ahhh... what the... More often than not, the work is mind-blowingly creative. A lot of them are around the lively wheelchair-accessible tourist drag on Central Avenue, though we covered a wider area by staying in the car.

Like when you're watching fireworks, it helps to have some picnic along. Our picnic was carryout from Love Food Café, 2057 Central Avenue, St. Petersburg, FL, 727-317-2034 lured by great reviews on Yelp.

What a lunch. The reuben sandwich packed a spicy black pepper-type kick behind each bite, and came with a side of dill potato salad. Mab's fiesta salad was the daily special with avocado slices, black beans and a lot of other good stuff. It and the potato salad tasted so fresh. It was packaged in cardboard cartons. So satisfying for $10 a plate, and we showed around our blissed-out post-lunchtime grins to the rest of the murals and then to the Dali Museum. Wonderful day.