Amalie Arena – Experiences

While you’re attending an event at the Amalie Arena in Tampa, Florida, you’re probably going to have some downtime where you’ll have a chance to explore the city. A bustling metropolis that retains a distinct southern character, Tampa is a city that’s brimming with sights, fun activities, and delicious places to dine so you won’t be without something to do on your visit.

The Amalie Arena is located on the tip of downtown Tampa, almost touching the Hillsborough Bay, so you’ll be within arm’s reach of some the city’s most notable attractions. Take a step back in time with a visit to the Henry B. Plant Museum, grab a custom slice at Fabrica Pizza, and take a tasting tour of Cigar City Brewing. The city of Tampa is a highly developed place where many cultures meet. This background is reflected in the amount of things you can see and do during your visit Amalie Arena while you’re in the city’s downtown area.

 

Morning

Noon

Night

Morning

Amalie ArenaYou’ve got a full day ahead, so it’s best not to neglect the most important meal of the day: breakfast. The Attic on Kennedy has you covered for both traditional and more adventurous breakfast and brunch selections. Classics like an omelet loaded with peppers, onions, and cheese as well as a Cuban sandwich topped with an egg are available but the chicken and waffles are a must try for the uninitiated.

In addition to having bar with a large array of beers and cider on tap, The Attic has a sizeable wine list as well as non-alcoholic drinks like tea, kombucha, and sparkling water. During brunch you can enjoy a pour of their mimosa coupled with blueberry French toast topped with whipped cream. All during brunch you can still order their breakfast sides too.

If you want to spend some time before your event enjoying Tampa’s parks and outdoors, the morning is the best time if you want to avoid both the crowds and the heat. Take a stroll at the Curtis Hixon Waterfront Park a scenic, eight-acre park in the western half of downtown Tampa, bordering the Hillsborough River that attracts over a million visitors annually.

The park is a meeting place for locals in addition to tourists, being dubbed “Tampa’s town square” and having features that make it welcoming for all visitors. Water features and the playground will appeal to younger guests, but everybody will love the fact that the park is dog-friendly. There’s ample shaded seating available under pavilions and alongside the river so it’ll be easy to stay out of the sun when you feel like taking a break from walking.
Regular visits from the area’s local water taxis stop at the park and circle around back to docks adjacent to the Amalie Arena, so if you need to get back to your event but want to bypass downtown Tampa traffic then a river ride may be for you.

During your visit to Tampa and the Amalie Arena, it would be remiss to not stop by the Florida Aquarium, one of the largest aquariums in the whole state. The main draw of the aquarium is its enormous, 500,000-gallon natural seawater tank that houses its own coral reef ecosystem. Other exhibits touch on ecosystems both foreign and domestic with animals from Florida’s own wetlands, such as river otters, as well as Madagascar with their distinctive ring-tailed lemurs.

Dive below the waves and visit the aquarium’s Waves of Wonder and Dragons Down Under exhibits where some of the most alien-looking marine life in the facility is housed. There you’ll fine seahorses and dragons as well as octopuses and striking moon jellyfish.

Noon

After your visit to the Florida Aquarium, the chances are good that you’ll be ready for some lunch. Only a couple blocks away is Fabrica Pizza, a pizzeria whose mainstay is their 12-inch customizable Neapolitan pizza. You can choose between a tomato or basil sauce base, or go entirely sauceless.
The sauce is just the beginning because Fabrica lets you pick from several different kinds of cheese in addition to dozens of toppings and garnishes for your custom pie. Fabrica has the standard toppings that everyone knows and loves, but you can also opt for something more out of the ordinary, such as fig marmalade or a fresh cracked egg on top.

Salads at Fabrica are buffet-style so you won’t have to worry about too much or not enough of anything. Those who might not prefer being presented with tons of choices for customization will be happy to pick from the tried and true pizza and salad favorites like a Margherita pie or chicken Caesar salad. For dessert, try one of their rich gelato with seasonal flavors or Nutella pizza.

If pizza isn’t a food that appeals to you, then check out the restaurants at the Sparkman Wharf. With nine restaurants and a beer garden, you’d be hard-pressed to find another diverse palette of eats so close by to the Amalie Arena. These smaller locations are specialized in what they serve, from the French-Vietnamese fusion at BT in a Box to Spanish-style tapas with sangria and Spanish wines at Montados.

You can also explore rich marine flavors from the Boat Run Oyster Company and their locally sourced stock. If by lunchtime you aren’t particularly hungry, Foundation Coffee Co. is a craft coffee spot at the wharf that uses high-class beans with special attention paid to each order to ensure for a top-quality brew.

For those who want to take a trip back in time to see how the upper-crust of Tampa lived during the gilded age, visit the Henry B. Plant Museum for a view into the city’s art, architecture, and culture. Before it was a museum, the building was known as the Tampa Bay Hotel, an elaborate hotel occupying four and a half acres of ground in a high-class, Moorish Revival architectural style. Today, the hotel is on the National Register of Historic Places and serves as a preserved glimpse into the luxury of days gone by.

Visitors can see the museum from the outside as well while enjoying a walk through Plant Park on the grounds while taking in the many details of the hotel’s architecture. The emerald green lawns and hedges of the hotel’s grounds are meticulously maintained like they were back in the day so touring the building from the outside is just as nice as seeing the interior.

Night

When the evening rolls around, you don’t want to have to worry about dinner and entertainment. Fortunately, Yacht Starship offers dining cruises for an experience that’s both delicious and memorable. Though you’ll need to reserve your space in advance, the effort is well worth it as three-course meals are prepared by Starship’s executive chef and paired with an extensive list of wines. Their honey garlic shrimp with Roman sausage is drizzled with grape salsa and feta cheese and the ribeye steak is served drizzled with a porcini demi-glace alongside seasonal vegetables.

The vibrant food selection served on Starship’s cruise is matched by their selection of signature coastal cocktails, including the Anchors Away, a salty spin on a Manhattan, or a strawberry basil margarita for something sweet and spicy.

Cruising along the second largest seaport in Florida you’ll find some of the best views of Tampa’s skyline, especially during sunset. If you’ve brought a partner along, you can enjoy dancing on the yacht’s promenade or lounge deck to romantic standards. Starship’s main dock is located only one block from the Amalie Arena if you need to be back in a hurry after dinner.

After you’ve docked back on land you can catch an evening show at the storied Tampa Theater. Built in 1926 during the heyday of grand theater construction, the theater is ornate with styles of the era and ritzy features like spiral columns and a Mediterranean courtyard, thus earning it a spot on the National register of Historic Places. Before nightly shows you’ll also be treated to a performance on the theater’s own Wurlitzer organ.

The Tampa Theater has a film selection that goes beyond what you’d find at your standard big name theater. The theater screens a wide range of foreign films, documentaries, indie movies, and classics on a daily basis, so they have something that can appeal to everyone. In addition to film, the theater regularly hosts live performances like music and stand-up comedy with big names as well as up-and-comers.

Amalie ArenaEnding the night with a tasty drink while enjoying the “best fish and chips in Florida” can only be done at the Yeoman’s Cask & Lion, a brewpub inspired by those across the pond in England. The beer selection at Yeoman’s Cask is huge at nearly five dozen varieties sourced from the local Tampa area as well as across the United States and other countries.

In addition to offering a number of the normal draft options like Guinness and Yuengling, they also serve their own house cask ale at a lower rate than everything else on tap. The wine selection is just as colorful with various expressions of reds, whites, and effervescent vintages. The cocktail selection also has something to work with any flavor pairing.

Before tucking into the main course, taste one of Yeoman’s Cask’s inspired appetizers like their pretzel-battered dill pickle spears, blackened gulf shrimp in Thai chili sauce, or their loaded nachos topped with tender pot roast. You can also expect to find typical pub-like burgers and sandwiches on the menu but a good portion is devoted to English favorites like bangers and mash and savory shepherd’s pie.

If you feel like stopping by for lunch rather than for a nightcap, Yeoman’s Cask has a special lunch menu of items that are $10 and less. The pub is situated only a few blocks from the Amalie Arena, so if your evening comes to a stop here the chances are good that you’ll be close by to where you’re staying.