Treasure Island: My Little Bit of Paradise in Florida

We own a week's timeshare at the Voyager, Treasure Island, week 41, which is normally around October 10 to 15. We arrive on a Saturday, and I spend most of my time walking the beach, sitting on my balcony looking out at the water and eating out.

Treasure Island is between Clearwater and St. Petersburg beach. Tourists do use it, but it is lesser known. Every morning I get up around 7.15 a.m. Make my coffee, put on my bikini and a tee shirt, and take the elevator down to the ground floor of my timeshare. Down the path and I am at the beach. The sand is so wide here; it takes several minutes to get to the shoreline. This is a good beach for shells and sand dollars. The sand is pretty pastel beige and the water sometimes looks blue and then green. I walk the beach early morning, mid-morning, and then at sunset. There is nothing more relaxing than letting the waves ripple over my feet, to cool them down.

There are a few hotels and lots of motels situated on the beach. We have been going to Treasure Island for 19 years. The first times we stayed in the little motels and I can remember the Page Hotel, which was painted green and white. We stayed in a couple of small ones that had kitchenettes too. The beach community uses these great places to stay. Many were built in the 1950's and continue in that style. Sands, Algiers, Sea Chest, Surf, the Thunderbirds and Bilmar are bigger ones, but still family style. Treasure Island is trying to preserve these motels because they are landmarks for this area. At one of our board meetings for the timeshare, we were told that the city is not allowing new buildings to be higher than 5 stories high. They do not want to loose the uniqueness of this area.