My time in Melbourne was so romantic and short lived. We visited this area because we were visiting a friends house, his new house that was built during the pandemic. I definitely had things in mind for this trip, and for this trip was like a vacation for me and we were supposed to see an old friend etc.
Well, the weather had other plans. Like many times when we hit the road in Florida the weather is volatile. Even though I plan around the weather and check the weather constantly during the days leading up to vacation there is only so much I can do. The day we left there was a pretty ominous storm coming in off the West Coast of Florida which inevitably followed us to the East Coast and delayed traffic in the most horrific way.
If you are familiar with traffic through Orlando is is terrible. It is terrible at rush hour and if you add a storm in that mix it's just horrible. So, it took us about 7 hours to get to Melbourne Beach when it should have taken 2.5 hours.
Our B&B: Port d'Hiver Bed and Breakfast,
Port d'Hiver Bed and Breakfast, was dreamy. There aren't really a lot of hotels on this coast that are 3 stars and up much less 4.5 which is around the range in which we stay. I have never stayed at a B&B and I had spent months researching Port d'Hiver Bed and Breakfast, and it was just perfect. It was just perfect. Every photo I have posted it was exactly like that with the exception it rained the whole time we were there other than a few hours here and there.
Some things about the B&B
(Port d'Hiver Bed and Breakfast) that I loved:
You can book your room in what house you want to stay in. Every house is different. From what I understand the main house is the oldest which was around 100 years old. The room we booked was the only one other than the one next to us with a view of the beach. This room was gorgeous. It had a full balcony, Juliette balcony, and a veranda that wrapped all the way around the room next to us and connected to the main balcony.
The room was quiet. There wasn't a lot of noise because the main house only had 1 other room which was next to us and the people checked out the night we checked in.
Food and drink happy hour is everyday between 4 and 7. Breakfast is 7 to 11am. They have a Chef or a cook and they make some home-styled items as well as cookies and brownies which they will also bring up to your room by request.
The balcony space is beautiful and breakfast on the balcony is ideal, but it was August and extremely hot.
The last thing I really liked that I wanted to make note of is that they have a full mini bar in the common area and 24/7 you can get whatever snacks, waters, juices you want from there (no alcohol though).
There were a few things that I didn’t t like and the Port d'Hiver Bed and Breakfast, website was a bit misleading. They say they can accommodate food allergies and gluten is listed as one. This is not true; I barely ate on this vacation not for a lack of trying. I had counted on eating (at least breakfast) at the B&B daily and they were not equipped to even make a gluten-free omelette . On day two we ordered breakfast and they brought me an omelette with potatoes on the side (and we specified the gluten issue ie; Celiacs we do not say gluten allergy most of the time because it won't be taken serious) both the omelette and potatoes contained gluten according to the staff after checking again.
Then it seemed they didn’t not really know what gluten was after talking to them more. They apologized profusely and said " it's her first day" referring to the person who took the order and subsequently making another omelette and sending it up to me. As comical as it was and sad, this omelette was just an empty egg folded over. No meat, no cheese, no veggies, just a big old fluffy egg patty.
It was so sad because it was probably one of the best cooked eggs I have had, it was so fluffy and nice, but I guess since they clearly didn't know what gluten was they freaked out and put nothing in it.
The t.v.'s did not work. Our suite had 2 smart t.v.'s in them and they clearly were not hooked up to any cable, satellite, or fios. Your only choice was to get a DVD from the main house or log into Netflix and I guess give that a try. I opted for neither because I had my laptop. Alas, WiFi wasn't working either so I had to use my phone as a hotspot. This is actually a deal breaker for a lot of people because not everyone is tech savvy.
Day 1 heading out of Tampa
Sabah travels 2022
Below: Some of the common areas and other houses
More of the main house:
More views from our suite:
IN THE CITY:
Rooftop at Hotel Melby
On to the restaurants.
I really wanted to try a lot of restaurants but the area just wasn't very gluten friendly. I lost weight on this trip to be honest because of lack of GF options available. I ate the little food I brought with me which I always do as a Celiac because you never know truly what the food situation is until you get on your trip. Chart House was the best meal we had the whole time we were there.
Chart House Melbourne Beach
Dinner in the city was touch and go. It seems like the downtown area is experiencing growth and gentrification and so there are a lot of restaurants popping up in hood areas that make food that is "Instagammable", but it doesn't taste good. My experience at the Hotel Melby rooftop was as disappointing as breakfast at the B&B and it happened on the same day too. I wanted to see more, but pretty much everything was working against us so we checked out and dipped. There were a few beach type mom and pop type restaurants near our B&B, but a lot of them were more fried seafood/tacos and things of that nature which usually is not gluten free because of fryers and cross contamination etc.
The funny thing is, the sun was out at checkout, but it was unbelievably hot (almost 100 degrees) and so we avoided the beach completely and as soon as we crossed the bridge to the mainland it started raining.
When we left the people at the B&B were so freaking sweet. Like, they all came outside and stood together and waved and was like bye! and they looked so happy. I really don't want to say anything bad about this place outside of just the facts about the food and cable. It was nice. I always wanted a B&B experience and this was better than I could hope for room wise because I know B&Bs are usually older and historic in Florida.
The suite we had at Port d'Hiver Bed and Breakfast was "sick". I am not sure if I will find myself in Melbourne Beach again in the future, but I hope that area has more to offer food wise because I would love to experience it.
* For reference because I know this post is very late, Artemis 1 was supposed to launch the week I was there in August 2022 and was delayed 2 times due to weather and then they eventually launched in late November. It would have been nice to see that, but it is what it is!
Both the left and right sides of our suite for reference:
I would have taken way more photos on this trip and obviously done more, but the rain was relentless and when it was not raining it was so humid my camera lens was foggy.
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