A Week In Siesta Key With An AirBNB Condo
My wife and I wanted to plan a vacation to Florida, and with the advice of a friend we found Siesta Key. If you aren’t aware, Siesta Key has been named the #1 Beach in America by Dr. Beach in his annual listing of the best beaches in the country.
A quick search online shows that there are no formal chain hotels in Siesta Key, with the closest property located in Sarasota, Florida, roughly 15-20 minutes away by car.
With no chain hotels available, our next step was to search AirBNB to see what sort of properties were available. Our requirements were simple. Near the beach and reasonably priced for one week in May.
After a lot of searching, I focused my sights on one property. The price was great, and from the photos, it was directly across the street from the main beach access. While the interior seemed dated and older, the past reviewers highly rated it’s cleanliness and communication with the host.
We booked the property for a week and were very excited about our upcoming trip!
We flew from Pittsburgh to Punta Gorda on Allegiant Air, and booked a Mercedes GL SUV from Turo to drive to the condo and around Siesta Key.
The condo was an hour drive from Punta Gorda airport, and upon arrival, the check-in instructions were clearly explained. We had officially arrived at the Crescent Royale Condominiums in Siesta Key!
Our next goal was to park the SUV, however, the parking spaces as well as the condo units are not labeled in order. It wasn’t uncommon to see parking spots and condo units next to each other such as (519, 112, 310, 206). This made things confusing, but we found our parking spot and condo unit.
Upon walking inside, the unit appeared clean and we got ready for a fun afternoon at the beach. Later that evening, we got ready for bed, and that is when the nightmare began. These beds were the absolute worst beds that we have ever slept in. You find more comfortable beds in a $10/night hotel in Phuket, Thailand than these. My wife and I are not heavy folks (130-135 pounds), yet when you laid on the bed, your body totally sunk in. On top of that, the pillows were maybe 1/2 an inch thick only, and the bed creaked anytime you moved. The creaking wasn’t just a slight creak, but a loud screeching “Creaaaaak”. If you did happen to fall asleep, as soon as you or your partner moved, you would wake up from the noise.
I contacted the host and expressed our concern after the second day, however, he explained that the condo was their second home, and they love their bed, so we could cancel our trip and receive a partial refund if we wanted to leave. We ended up sucking it up and staying the rest of the week, but needless to say, we didn’t get any sleep.
The reason we wanted to stay was the location. The condo was clean, and the views from the Lanai deck were incredible. You could get from the Lanai to the beach in less than 2 minutes walking. How perfect is that?
Aside from the bedding issues, we had no other complaints that trip until the second to last day. I came inside to get some fruit out of the refrigerator for us to eat on the lanai, and met the largest cockroach that I have ever seen on the kitchen floor. I tried to kill it, but the little bugger was too quick for me. I called the condo unit and our host, but unfortunately, no one was of any help. You know the saying, if you see one, you don’t know how many more you are not seeing. This made us anxious and ready to leave and get home. We searched and sealed all of our clothing to prevent any of them from sneaking home with us.
On our last night, I came inside and didn’t turn on the light until the last minute. When I did, I caught the roach under my sandals near the front door. I had him cornered, and BOOM. Success. No more roach.
We followed the check out instructions and left the condo having had a good overall vacation. Upon further discussions with the host, we received a small bit of compensation for the bedding, which made us very happy. We would recommend his place in the future.