Tampa/St. Petersburg Travel Guide

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Adventure Activities in Tampa -- Try if You Dare

Getty Images Thrill-seeking in Tampa, Florida will most likely lead you...Read More

5 Best Photo Opportunities in Tampa Bay

Lee Van Grack There are no bad photo opportunities in Tampa Bay. Sunsets...Read More

Tampa/St. Petersburg OVERVIEW

Cypress Gardens

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Busch Gardens in Tampa

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Sunset

Alamy

Downtown Tampa

Alamy

Sunshine Skyway Bridge

Corbis

Parachute into the heart of Tampa and chances are you’ll be treading water. The area crowds two sides of salty Tampa Bay and they’re as delightfully different as grits and garbanzos. A bridge hop gets you between the two so you can savor sand and surf in the morning and climb aboard a hotdog-tossing roller coaster in the afternoon. Florida Spring Break 2013: Join our road trip across the stateBridges are iconic of the area’s history and culture; a Southern city that played a role in the Civil War, it has strong ties to Cuba with some Sicily and Greece thrown in for good measure. Whether your background is grits—a not-so-polite reference to native Southerners—or you’re from the garbanzo-fied Latin-Mediterranean side of the spectrum, Tampa Bay seamlessly blends Southern beach culture with pan-Caribbean hedonism. You can boat-and-beach nearly year round, coming in out of the sun for a tasty dose of culture at one of city’s museums. Afterward there’s the unhurried time after the sun submerges ...See More into the Gulf of Mexico for sampling eateries or staggering from one watering hole to the next. Tampa has its own theme park—Busch Gardens—but the mid-state location also means it’s only an hour from Orlando and close to Old Florida attractions such as Weeki Wachee Springs. You can chase birdies on a dozen superb nearby courses or chase blackfin tuna, hundred-pound tarpon and hard-fighting Spanish mackerel in the waters in and outside of the bay. See Less

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