Booked w/Tropical Sands to Siesta Key for one week April / May of 2011. Seems turnover of staff at Tropical Sands is high - in two months there must have been 5 different people handling my reservation and in all the shuffle, people were getting confused with my (1) dates of stay (2) my deposits (3) my final payment. I was getting emails over and over again about issues that were already taken care of and it was frustrating and time consuming. Condo we rented was very nice, new and modern and had everything you needed (kitchen was equipped, plenty of towels in bathrooms, etc). Unfortunate for us we came down during the weeks that the Florida "love bugs" Invaded like a plague. They were everywhere - thousands - which I don't mind outside. It's when they were inside the condo, crawling on us while we slept, crawling on our food ... it became a problem. This condo is being sold for $2 million and is only 2 years old, however the bugs worked there way in under the front door, through the cracks in all the sliding glass doors. It was amazing - you would be sitting there watching TV and just turn and look at the bugs pouring in from under the doors. We vacuumed at least 10 - 15 times per day just to keep up with the invasion. Always nice to have to vacuum and clean like this on your only one week vacation a year :(
We immediately notified Tropical Sands of the apparently faulty construction of this condo and the fact that bugs were pouring in through every crack. Their reply was "oh that's impossible - you must have left the sliding glass doors open" ! LOL - really? Oh yeah, usually when we see swarms of thousands of bugs on the deck and railings we open the doors really really wide to see how many will come in. C'mon. Get real.
Due to the bug invasion, we couldn't use the rooftop pool of the unit, nor could we grill on the BBQ on the very large and beautiful outside deck. So we got 1/2 of what we paid for. A few days later it rained really hard, which then left over 2 feet of water in the street in front of our unit. We were out that day at the store and we couldn't get back to the condo because our street (and only our street) was under 2 feet of water!! The water was all the way up to the front door. After a few hours it receded a little and we were able to get back in.
That very same night, the transformer on the electricity pole literally exploded and blew up, which then left us with no power. And funny enough, it wasn't the electricity for the entire block, or even one or two houses ... just our condo, lol. So we sat for hours in the dark and sweating (no power = no a/c) while we called the local utility company and begged them to send someone out to check this out. That was at 6 pm - finally around 11 pm someone came out. The electricity pole was covered in vines and the combo of the vines getting wet by the heavy rains caused the transformer to blow.
With regard to Siesta Key itself, yes the beaches are beautiful. The sand is powder white (and never gets hot!) and the water was clean and blue. I have to tell you though - if you are under the age of 50, this might not be the place for you. Everyone in the town is basically 65 and up. It is very boring at night. Even in the "down town" area of Siesta Village. A couple of bars with some not so great food and lots of the local "younger" weirdo's hanging out until all hours of the night. We are from NY so not much phases us in the weirdo department but this was a real strange environment. We even saw a few hookers - lol - which really made us laugh. Things on the "Key" are also very expensive, so if you have a car, you should drive over the bridge to Sarasota for whatever it is you need. The restaurants there are better too. If you can, try Legacy Grill in Sarasota - food was great - service was amazing.
We have been visiting Florida for over 20 years and have been everywhere from Tallahassee to Miami. We would not come back to Siesta Key again. If you are interested in white sands, and blue waters, go all the way down to the Florida Keys - you will have a much better experience. read more