See Jackie Runn: I'll Take A Margarita!

I attended the Tampa Bay Margarita festival last year and had a blast. I attended with general admission tickets with my friend Sara, and we met up with a few of our friends while we were there. It was hot, and the lines were a big long - but a nice sunny day in Florida paired with friends and margaritas? What could top that?

The Tampa Bay Margarita Festival happened to fall on May 24th this year. That was also my boyfriend Adam's birthday. We decided it would be a great way to celebrate since we're both fans of the drink. The festival also, like last year, fell on the same day as the Color Me Rad 5k. We were going to be busy bees that day.

We ran our race in the morning. It was hot, and we wound up covered in color. After we were done turning into the rainbow we headed home to clean up. We spent a good amount of time at home and headed to the Margarita festival a little on the late side. It was a super hot day and we wanted to beat some of the heat.

We arrived at the festival around 5:30-6pm. There were still tons of people just arriving. We had VIP passes, so our line was relatively short to check in. It only took a few minutes. (I mention this because it's one of the reasons the VIP option is so great at these events.) After we were in the park we walked around checking out what was going on around the park and then headed to the VIP cabana.

The VIP area is awesome. For one, it's a giant tent, so it keeps you out of the direct heat of the scorching hot Florida sun. Like I mentioned before, it was very hot that day - being under a tent made it so much more comfortable. There were also mist fans to keep us cool.

We had our own bartenders so the lines were super short - which was good, because we get unlimited drinks. I started of trying a Raspberry Pear and Mango jalapeño margarita. The raspberry pear was just okay in my opinion, and the mango syrup in the mango jalapeño was a bit too thick and syrupy. The jalapeño was a nice change, however, and gave the drink a nice kick.

I wound up just sticking with the classic margarita after that, and those were perfect. No complaints from me on that one! Adam was also a fan of the classic.

I had a great time mingling with all of my blogger friends. I ran into Lindsey during the first time on line and we chatted about our experiences early that morning during Color Me Rad. It was her first 5k! how exciting.

On the second trip to the bar we ran into Nichole and I also spotted Denise. Then Chrissy found her way over to us. Everyone was having a great time. We had all been chatting it up for a while when we realized it was about time for the headliner band - grammy winning Los Lonely Boys to start. Denise and I headed out of the tent and over to the stage so we could try to get a good viewpoint.

The band was amazing. They played a few songs including a hit of theirs from a few years back, "Heaven". All in attendance were excited for that one!

As the night moved along we also bumped into (maybe a little too literally) Caitlyn and Charity. Then somehow it became an opportunistic time for the photography sessions us bloggers are known for.

As you can see, we were all obviously having an amazingly good time. Unfortunately the night did have to come to an end. But before it was all over....there were fireworks that lit up the Tampa Bay sky!

I had an awesome time at the Tampa Bay Margarita Festival and patiently await the next of Big City Events fabulous soirees - Summer of Rum Festival on August 16th. Hopefully I'll see you there!

*As part of the Tampa Bay Bloggers I was given 2 VIP tickets to this event in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own.